


Playing With Matches

by kristinnlizz



Category: My Chemical Romance, The Used
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-10
Updated: 2020-07-25
Packaged: 2021-03-03 02:26:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 31,612
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24117217
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kristinnlizz/pseuds/kristinnlizz
Summary: The year is 2020 and The Used goes on tour with My Chemical Romance once again while Bert and Gerard deal with their history.
Relationships: Bert McCracken/Gerard Way, Frank Iero/Gerard Way
Comments: 41
Kudos: 45





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Yaaa so listen, quarantine has really driven me to this extreme because I literally haven't written fic in years but here we are. Sorry if it's bad, my b. I might continue it, might not. Let me know what you think. Also this is rude as fuck but I’m kind of imagining like, 2016 Gerard bc 2020 Gerard is looking real...43, and that’s all I’ll say about that. Oh ps, I kind of got this idea from listening to Obvious Blasé by The Used, the new album’s tight as fuck, thanks and god bless

Los Angeles is the strangest place there ever was, Bert thought as he drove through the city, arm hanging out the window of his rental. He had been there for a few weeks recording for the new album and it was a strange feeling whenever he ended up there. The people, the pavement, the places— it always brought up old feelings for him, but this time he was dealing with feelings he’d really thought he’d never revisit. A few days into his stay, he’d received a call from their agent asking if he’d be willing to speak with Gerard Way while he was here, which he really had to think about for a while; it was honestly weird to think it’d been so long since they’d spoken that Gerard had gone through their agent instead of just calling directly. They did end things pretty badly, and in fact if he remembered correctly, the last time they spoke was more of a screaming match than a conversation, fueled on his end by a haze of drugs and liquor and leading to Bert taking out his anger in an entire album and a lot more drugs.

And yet here he was, driving to a coffee shop to meet Gerard after an extremely awkward phone call between them the other day to schedule a meeting, and he wasn’t certain that the meeting itself would be any less awkward, and on top of that, he couldn’t possibly imagine why the other man would even want to talk to him in the first place. If Bert thought about it for too long, he could admit that he still had a bit of anger about how they’d left things but it was also so long ago that most of it had melted into guilt and embarrassment, and honestly, his curiosity was certainly piqued.

Minutes later, he was walking into a cafe with a weight in his chest, looking around like he was on a blind fucking date. He hadn’t been nervous the entire ride over but the nerves were definitely kicking in now. When he spotted Gerard at a table in the corner and the other man put his hand up in a short wave, his heart jumped a little.

“Hey man,” Gerard exclaimed, standing to greet the other with a handshake and a grin.

“Been awhile, right?” Bert laughed and took a breath to shake some of the nerves, sitting down at the table.

“I grabbed you a coffee, not sure how you like it, but I brought some milk and sugar so you could fix it up if you want,” Gerard said, a little shakily if Bert wasn’t mistaken.

“No this is great, thanks dude.” Bert took a breath and a few moments to just stare. Gerard looked good— definitely older but good. “Uhm...you look good, Gee.” Shit, no! Weird! So weird. Also did he even have a right to the nickname anymore? It sort of felt like he didn’t and felt way too personal now. 

The other man thankfully just laughed and bowed his head briefly in thanks, “You too, Bert. We’re not in our twenties anymore, that’s for sure. You’ve got kids now, yeah? How are they? And um...Alison right? How is she?”

“Yeah, thanks, they’re good,” Bert smiled, taking a sip of the coffee Gerard had offered to him, “Congrats on Umbrella Academy, dude. You know I’m not into that stuff, but I actually watched a couple episodes because I knew it was yours, and it’s pretty good.”

Gerard raised his eyebrows and chuckled. “Not something I ever thought I’d hear coming from you but thank you, means a lot. Yeah it’s been fun.”

“And how’s Lindsey and Bandit, Mikey and everyone?”

“Good! Yeah, everyone’s great.”

They sat in silence for a few seconds too long, just watching each other. Bert cleared his throat and looked down at the table. “So um...what’s up?” He asked, the way he did on a professional phone call after the small talk was over, which he immediately felt was stupid as soon as it came out. He also realized at this moment that he wasn’t sure if he’d ever even spoken to this man sober before, and that was a strange thought. 

Gerard nodded and sat up in his chair a little, nervously biting at his lip. “Yeah so uh...I actually have a question but I wanted to ask you in person because I feel like we have some stuff to talk about first. I kind of figured if I’d asked through your agent you would have said no.” He cupped his hands around his coffee cup and sighed. “So, some news. We’re getting the band back together, announcing it soon, probably Halloween.”

Bert raised his eyebrows and dropped his jaw a little, reaching over to grab Gee’s shoulder, the contact hitching his breath a little. “Wow, fuck man, good for you guys! The fans are gonna lose their minds!”

“Yeah, we’re all stoked. But um...we’re also planning a tour next fall and...well it was actually Frank’s idea but...I thought it would be cool if The Used came with us. But I know we didn’t exactly wish each other the best when we left off and I just...don’t really know where you stand on it now and I know it’s really weird to even ask you to have this conversation after we haven’t even seen each other for so long and in this fucking coffee shop of all places but Frank kind of made me realize that you and I needed to talk first or else both of our bands would shy away from the idea because no one wants to tour with two assholes who hate each other and I don’t—“

“Gee, I was an addict, you know? We both were, and then suddenly you weren’t and...I feel like it’s the elephant in the room so we might as well just...” Bert interrupted, swallowing a lump in his throat, because he hated that Gerard seemingly felt more empathy toward him than he felt like he deserved, “I feel like you did what you had to do and so did I and we just...we did what we could. I think we both knew from the beginning that we were playing with matches a little bit. And I don’t know if I would have ever gotten to that place if I hadn’t gotten sober and I just...started to understand you a little better, you know?” He paused a moment, knowing he was sort of simplifying his feelings but was not about to cry in this coffee shop, so he had to reign it in a little. “It’s been fifteen years, Gerard. I think about you a lot actually. Miss you sometimes, even. I miss...getting so fucked up with you,” he laughed, getting a smile from Gee before he continued, “Sometimes I even wonder what it would have been like if I’d gotten sober when you did, how things would have gone. But I know we’re both different people now and I honest to god don’t even know what a sober friendship with you looks like but I do know that it won’t look like the shit show we used to be, you can assure that to Frank.”

“I...wasn’t really expecting that,” Gerard replied, clearly processing Bert’s emotional spewing.

“Sorry I—“ Bert cleared his throat and sunk a little in his chair, wondering if he’d said too much. “I sort of figured this stuff was gonna come up and I’ve been thinking about it a lot over the last few days.”

“Yeah, no, I mean, me too,” the older man across from him made eye contact for a few moments before looking back to his coffee cup and lowering his voice to a softer tone, “I think about you too. When Frank brought it up, I wasn’t really sure what I thought about it at first. I just know that I said a lot of things to you that were unfair and I wanted you to get sober but I shouldn’t have pushed so hard. And that last night was…I don’t know...I just...I’m sorry, Bert. I sort of feel like we missed out on fifteen years because of me. I could have been there for you when you got sober, you could have been there for me when I relapsed.”

Bert laughed at that last one. “I think we can both agree that it wasn’t just because of you. Takes two to tango, Gee. Is ‘Gee’ okay? Do people still call you that?”

“Yes, Gee is fine,” the older man replied with an empathetic smile, figuring ‘takes two to tango’ was a pretty Bert way to say ‘I’m sorry.’ “So...friends? For now?” He held out a hand as a truce. 

Bert laughed and grabbed Gerard’s hand, giving it a small squeeze. “Friends for now. And yes to the tour. Gotta run it by everyone but I think they’ll be stoked.” He reached absentmindedly for his pocket where his cigarettes were and could have made an excuse to leave, actually did have an excuse to leave, as he had to be at the studio soon, but he sort of wanted this not to end. “Do you...do you want to have a smoke with me?”

Gerard nodded and stood up with him, and he felt the weight in his chest get a little lighter.


	2. Chapter 2

More than a year later, their first show had come to a close and the air around the venue was electric. After Spring of 2020’s covid19 madness bled into summer and their European shows got postponed, no one expected this to actually be their first show of the tour, but everyone on the road with them was so stoked to be together after months of quarantine. No one was tired, which was clear by the green room shots most of them had taken as soon as they came off stage earlier. They had to ship out to Chicago in a couple of hours but Bert knew no one would be sleeping before they left, even he himself had a redbull in hand as he stepped out the back door into the night air, grateful that it was at least breezy outside, although the warmth of summer was still holding on.

He lit a cigarette and took a long drag, exhaling as he looked up at the stars. They were much brighter here than they were in LA where they’d rehearsed, which was sort of nice. Spotting a small width of grass between the edge of the bus parking lot and a fence, he walked over, minding his cigarette as he laid down on his back and setting the redbull beside him. Bert watched the sky, pondering the night’s show. He’d watched My Chem’s set— the entire thing—- because he honestly couldn’t pull his eyes away. The crowd had so much energy for them and Gerard had control over everyone in that audience. He’d forgotten how much Gee came alive on stage, miles from the shy, laid-back guy he usually was, and he’d forgotten the crazed look in his eyes as he sang; even his body language was different, confident, with a sort of swagger. It was something Bert had actually hated after they’d broken things off, but he’d realized tonight that it was most likely because it was what had initially attracted him to the older man way back when.

Gerard was fucking hot on stage, Bert could admit that. It wasn’t even really his opinion, it was just fucking objective, okay? The man swaggers around out there in a t-shirt that barely fits and jeans that don’t leave too much to the imagination, revealing a strip of his hips every twenty seconds and drenched in sweat. At one point between a chorus and a verse, Gee had even looked over at him side-staged with those crazy eyes, one foot on a monitor, licking his lips and holding his bottom lip between his teeth, as if he knew he had control in that moment over Bert just like the rest of the crowd, knew he was being watched and milking it, and though the brief eye contact felt to Bert like an eternity, it couldn’t have been more than six seconds, but it was long enough for it to be burned into his mind.

Laughter, yelling, and music being turned on in the distance told him that others were making their way out of the venue. “Hey Bert, you good?” A voice by their tour bus door shouted in his direction, and Bert lifted his head off the ground slightly to make out who the voice belonged to— Quinn. Bert raised a hand to signal his wellness and Quinn returned the gesture as he disappeared into the bus.

“Bert? Hey!” Another voice shouted, getting closer until he realized it was Gerard, now standing over him and drinking from a half crushed water bottle, a towel around his neck but still so sweaty that Bert wasn’t sure the other man had even used it. “What are you doing down there?”

“I don’t know, looking at the stars, man,” he responded as the older man got down on the grass next to him, dumping the remainder of his water bottle on his face and giving it a wipe with the towel, “Don’t they make you feel sort of...alive and...small?”

“Small? What the fuck dude are you like, okay? I’ve never known you to have much interest in astronomy,” Gerard chuckled and reached over Bert to steal a sip of his redbull, his fingertips brushing lightly past Bert’s ribs.

Bert took in a sharp breath at the contact and closed his eyes, taking another drag of his cigarette and stubbing the nub out into the dirt. “No, I mean I don’t, I just mean small in the best possible way, like nothing we do on this planet really matters, like all of our problems are so insignificant, you know?”

“I hear you, man. Can I bum a cig?” The other singer asked. Bert nodded and slipped the box from his pocket, handing one to Gee and lighting one for himself before reaching over to light the other’s, an action that felt strangely intimate after so long. “I usually don’t smoke at home around Linds and Bandit but tour is always a freebie with most things, even after this long.”

Bert nodded in agreement. “Same, even Alison gave me permission to fuck around and I didn’t even ask for that. I was like, with who, Dan?” He laughed at his own joke as he lifted his hips slightly to slide his smokes back into his pocket, thinking for a moment he saw Gee’s eyes glance down as he did so. “You know, it’s weird how familiar this all feels, even though it’s all so different. Feels like old times already.”

Gerard nodded beside him in contemplation as he smoked. “What are these, Spirits?”

“Call me a hippie,” Bert laughed.

“I guess things really have changed, huh?”

“They really have. Okay here are some things I’ve wanted to say to you over the past fifteen years,” he began with a grin, “One, I’ve definitely written some songs about you over the years, probably a short album’s worth. Two, I know The Black Parade is like your legacy, and I respect it, but I honestly wasn’t a big fan. However, I thought Danger Days was full of fuckin bangers. Vampire Money was really slept on, that shit’s a bop, maybe one of your best songs ever, in my opinion. Three, sobriety is fuckin boring but I guess boring is kind of the point, huh?”

The other man let out a hearty laugh and took another sip of Bert’s redbull. “Okay, I’ll need a playlist of these songs that are allegedly about me submitted to my desk by 5pm tomorrow. Second, I appreciate it about Danger Days; I also love Vampire Money. I like your new shit, too, 1984-Infinite Jest is fuckin’ tight, I don’t even know how you guys came up with that shit,” he turned his head to face Bert, examining the younger man’s side profile, watching his blonde hair move in the breeze and the way the parking lot lights gleamed against the drying sweat that remained against the lines of Bert’s shoulder muscles. “And yeah boring is definitely the point. For us, we basically have a choice between boring or being so crossed that you have no idea where you are or what day it is or about anyone around you, or even about yourself. It was dark back there, man.”

Bert hummed in solemn agreement as he continued to inhale sweet smoke, becoming aware of the heat radiating from Gerard’s arm next to his on the grass and the man’s breath hitting his neck when the other had turned to look at him. 

“I think that’s part of the reason I left that night, you know?” Gee continued, “I didn’t feel like I could even talk to you about the darkness because you didn’t even know you were in it and it just felt like with everything I said to you about it, you took more and more offense and I just had nothing else to say to you anymore.”

Bert swallowed and turned his head to the other side of the sky, wanting desperately in this moment to get away from Gerard’s burning gaze on his skin. “No. I knew about the darkness. I think I had this delusion that I liked it only because you were in it with me. It was like this fucked up cocoon just for us. And that night I realized you were abandoning me and I suddenly felt alone.” He took a few seconds for himself and the stars before he forced himself to turn back, to look Gerard in the eyes— he knew the other man deserved at least that. “Some of those songs about you...they’re pretty dark. I was pretty angry for a long time.” The older man stayed silent for a stretch, so he continued, “Look, I don’t know how seriously you took AA and I definitely didn’t but I’m pretty sure I owe you an amends. It was selfish of me to treat you that way, like it was all about me, because it wasn’t, but I wasn’t thinking about you at all, or taking your sobriety seriously, and that wasn’t fair to you. I’m sure I did so many other shitty things to you but I think that’s what made this go downhill. I’m just...sorry it ended the way it did. I’m really sorry, Gee.”

Gerard just stared back into Bert’s eyes with a strange combination of empathy and a little fear. Bert understood that; it felt strange and difficult letting go of fifteen year old emotions, letting go of a grudge they’ve held for so long, even if they understood each other now. “I’m sorry, too. It was selfish of me to push you. I should have been more understanding. I know what you mean about sharing the darkness. It did feel that way for awhile. It’s nice being sober with you, though. It almost feels like a different sort of cocoon, since most people here aren’t. I certainly remember a lot more of our conversations and a lot more...of you.”

Gee reached his arm across his waist and Bert felt every movement of the other’s fingers slipping into his shorts pocket to steal another cigarette from him, the edge of his inner thigh on fire from the heat memory of Gee’s fingertips, even if only through the fabric lining of his pocket. “Did you like the show?” Gee asked in a smug tone, letting the cigarette dangle from the side of his lips as he lit it and tossing the box and lighter between them on the grass. He turned onto his side and rested his head in one hand, elbow on the ground. 

Bert shifted his hips to get onto his side, as well, feeling Gerard’s breath clashing with his own. “You’re such an ass. You’ve still got some fire up there. The crowd ate it up.”

“Yeah they did,” the older man replied in a low tone, shifting to a whisper in the shell of Bert’s ear, “And so did you.”

Bert felt Gee’s words radiate through his body, his already quickened heart rate picking up. He took the last drag of his cigarette and reached over Gerard’s middle to put it out in the grass behind him, grabbing a handful of the other man’s t shirt and looking him dead in the eyes with a smirk and a whisper to match the other’s, “Fuck. You.”

As soon as the last syllable came off his lips, Gerard was closing the space between them, crashing together in a mess of teeth and tongues. Gee’s mouth tasted like smoke and sweat and something else that was familiar and exclusively Gerard, a tactile memory that Bert didn’t even know he had. He let go of Gee’s t-shirt and slid his hand to the back of the other’s neck, fingers entwining roughly with his black hair and eliciting a soft sigh from the other’s mouth into his own. His other hand snaked up Gee’s side and rested there on his soft skin just under his t-shirt for a moment before continuing to explore.

Bert felt Gerard’s fingers running down along the muscles of his arm and then up the front of his t-shirt, making him almost breathless and desperate when he pulled away from their kiss only to suck hard at his neck just under his earlobe. “How did you somehow get fucking hotter?” Gerard breathed against Bert’s collarbone, biting roughly at the skin there and making Bert groan, grinding his hips into Gerard’s.

“We need…fuck...” Bert started breathlessly as Gerard squeezed his thigh, “We need to go somewhere.”

“I want you to fuck me right in this parking lot,” Gerard said huskily into his ear, nipping at his earlobe, which could have been enough to make him come in his fucking pants right then and there. 

Bert sat up quickly and glanced around for a moment, standing and pulling Gerard up with him. “Come here,” he said, pulling him over behind the back of a bus and pressing his lips into the other’s once more, shoving Gee against the bus and fumbling his hands over the button of the other’s jeans. He bit at Gerard’s earlobe and pulled his zipper down agonizingly slowly, speaking into the shell of his ear in a low tone, “Is this what you want, you fucking slut? For anyone to walk up and see you getting fucked?” 

“Y-yes, fuck Bert, please,” Gerard whimpered.

Bert slipped his hand past the waistband of the older man’s boxers and wrapped his fingers around his length, moving in slow strokes and kissing Gerard once more. “Missed this cock so fucking much,” he mumbled against the other’s lips and feeing him shudder. He pulled back from the kiss and pressed his first two fingers to Gerard’s bottom lip, watching in a haze as the taller man took them in, sucking down to the knuckle and keeping his eyes on Bert’s. He slowly ran his thumb over the tip of Gee’s cock and pulled a low moan from the other man which vibrated around his fingers. Bert could feel his own cock straining against the denim of his shorts, throbbing as he watched Gerard unravel, and like on queue, the older man’s hands moved to his waist to unbutton and unzip and then palm against his hard-on through his boxers for a few moments before pushing them down mid-thigh and then doing the same to his own. 

“Turn around, slut,” Bert whispered as he slid his fingers from Gee’s mouth. He wasted no time as the other man turned, one hand and a cheek against the bus and a quiet whimper falling from his lips as Bert let go of his cock to steady the other’s hips, pressing his fingers to Gerard’s entrance. Bert slid them in slowly to give him time to adjust, watching Gee’s face flicker between pain and pleasure, his eyes closed and his lips parted slightly. He slid a third finger in and planted a line of kisses down the side of Gerard’s neck, beginning to scissor his fingers apart slowly.

Gerard let out a long, low groan and pushed back against Bert’s fingers. “Fuck…Bert, f-fuck me, I’m ready.”

Bert slid his fingers out and spat into his hand, coating his cock quickly and grabbing the base, teasing the tip at Gerard’s hole and pressing forward ever so slightly, whispering against the other’s neck. “Want you to beg.”

“Bert,” Gerard responded in a whine, stretching his name into multiple syllables, “I...I need it, want your cock so fucking bad, want to feel you inside...please…” he tapered off, moaning and scraping his shoe impatiently against the dirt.

“What an impatient fuckin’ slut,” Bert muttered with a low laugh, digging his fingernails into the skin at Gee’s hip before pushing his cock in. Gerard gasped and made a noise like a long growl, trying to stifle the loud moan that would have come out otherwise. Bert hummed in pleasure and remained still for a few moments so Gee could adjust before slowly pulling out again and pushing back in, quickening his pace after a few thrusts and nipping at Gerard’s neck.

“Fuck, harder, please...please,” Gerard begged, pushing back into Bert’s thrusts. Bert complied and slammed into Gerard over and over, knowing neither of them would last very long after so much time apart. 

“Holy shit Bert, right there, right there,” Gerard cried, subsequently biting into his wrist to quiet his moans as Bert reached around to grab his cock, pulling in time with his thrusts. Bert could feel the heat rising in his stomach and knew he was close, leaning in and biting at Gerard’s earlobe.

“You’re so fucking hot, Gee,” he murmured as he felt Gerard’s legs begin to shake a little, being sure to keep a hand on the other’s hip to steady him if he needed it. “You gonna fucking come for me, Gee? I wanna see you come for me, right in my fucking hand.”

Bert released a moan as Gerard’s muscles contracted around him, squeezing his cock tight as the older man shook and exploded onto Bert’s fingers. Watching Gee was too much and Bert followed quickly after, releasing inside of Gerard, the two of them riding it out together for a few moments before finally slowing down. He pressed a brief kiss to the corner of the other’s lips and slowly pulled out, wiping his hand unceremoniously on the back of the bus and hoping it rained before anyone noticed. 

Watching a fucked-out Gerard recovering quietly against the bus, he glanced around in the grass for wherever Gerard’s sweat towel had ended up, grabbing it to clean up a little before pulling up his shorts and fastening them. He spotted his cigarettes and lighter a few feet away and grabbed those, as well, handing the towel to Gerard before lighting up a smoke, saving another in his hand for Gee before slipping the rest back into his pocket. He sat down on the grass against the fence, knees to his chest, and took a drag while he watched Gerard clean himself up, drop the towel on the ground, and button up his jeans.

Gerard finally looked over at him, head back against the fence, legs spread slightly, one hand dangling over a knee and his burning cigarette in the other, watching him back. Bert handed him the other cigarette and Gee laughed incredulously, shaking his head and sitting down next to the younger man. “What?” Bert asked, smoke swirling lazily around his head.

He rested the cigarette between his lips and looked around for the lighter. Bert held the middle of his cigarette and leaned closer, pressing the end to Gerard’s. Gee inhaled and nodded in thanks, leaning back against the fence. “I don’t know. I don’t know what it is exactly,” the older man laughed again and took another drag before going on, “You’re just...so you. I guess in the back of my mind, I wondered how much of the you that I knew before was still...you know...you...now?”

“You lost me, dude,” Bert replied with a raised eyebrow.

“Before tour, I just wasn’t really sure if I knew who you were anymore. But you haven’t changed at all,” Gerard tried to explain with a soft smile, staring down at his lap for a few moments, “I haven’t had sex with a dude in awhile, but I thought we might and I was kinda nervous. I thought it wouldn’t be the same, but it’s like...the same but better. You’re the same but better.”

Bert grinned and scratched absentmindedly at a spot of come on Gerard’s jeans. “Dude I don’t know how to tell you this but I think you’re fuckin’ gay,” he said, wiping the come quickly on Gee’s cheek, ducking the other’s swipe at his head and getting up to run a few feet away.

Gee stood up and replied through lips clamped on his cigarette, “Yeah you better fuckin’ run.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh hey there, I actually wrote another chapter of this. Trust me, I’m just as surprised as the rest of you. I also made a Spotify playlist for you to listen to while you read this entitled STADAG, which stands for Songs That Are Definitely About Gerard, and listen it’s just my opinion and it’s probably not correct but hey we’re all just having fun here alright, sue me. Here’s the playlist:
> 
> https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1wpQDyXbA9KjAYqmtTGFTP?si=Y17Pj-bcR62ZZkdwSVaAzQ
> 
> Also tw; drug use?? Idk if that’s a trigger for people but just tryna be nice.

Gerard was settling back into his bus much later in the early morning, just before they were about to head off to the next city. Most of the others had crashed much earlier but Gerard and Bert had stayed up talking and chain-smoking for hours. It was strange how conversation came back easily after all this time, the two of them so smoothly settling back into their patterns with each other, and Gerard realized just how much he had missed his old friend.

He flicked the hall light off and climbed into his bunk, pulling the curtain closed and the covers up a little. His phone lit up from beside him and he saw a text from Bert linking him to a Spotify playlist and a short message:

 _Good Morning Gerard,  
I hope this message finds you well. I’ve attached the link to the songs about you above, as per your request that I get it to you on a deadline. Please let me know if there’s anything else I can do for you, sir.  
Thank you,  
Robert_

Gerard chuckled quietly to himself and shook his head, grabbing his headphones from the corner of his bunk and booting up the playlist. He’d obviously heard them all before as he was quite familiar with The Used discography but it was somewhat of a new experience listening knowing they were about him. The first song was Sound Effects and Overdramatics which he already knew was about him, but he listened anyway, thinking about their past.

~  
**February 2006, Los Angeles**

Gerard entered Bert’s apartment and tossed his keys on the kitchen counter, cracking his neck one way and the other as he took his jacket off and releasing a long sigh. “Bert?” He yelled into the apartment, glancing around for the younger man as he kicked off his shoes. Gee rubbed his tired eyes while he walked back toward the bedroom. “Babe?” He called out down the hallway, reaching the bedroom and watching the tail end of Bert snorting a line off the edge of the digital piano on his lap. Bert tossed a rolled up dollar bill onto the nightstand and began playing a melody.

“Hey Gee, how was your day?” he finally replied, looking up at the older man through blown pupils and continuing to play, pushing his lips out in a kiss shape. 

Gerard scanned his eyes over the messy room, the vial of coke on the nightstand, and the bottle of whiskey sitting on the carpet by Bert’s side. This was a pretty standard scene but Gee had had a particularly stressful day and was only a month and some change sober, so walking into this was difficult in the moment because all he really wanted to do was pick up that vial. He simply closed his eyes and waved his hand in a ‘whatever’ gesture in response to Bert’s question. “Shitty. I’m so tired.”

Bert stopped playing his keyboard and moved it off of his lap onto the floor. “What’s wrong, babe?” Bert asked, looking up at Gerard and patting the mattress beside him to get him to sit.

Gerard sat down and weighed his options for a moment. What he really wanted was to ask Bert to put away the booze and drugs for tonight because he’d had a bad day and he was having a hard time with sobriety; they’d already had some version of that conversation multiple times over the past few weeks, however, and it had always led into an argument which he really didn’t want tonight. “Nothing, I’m fine. Just really wiped. I might just go to sleep now, honestly.”

“It’s literally 8pm,” Bert responded skeptically.

“I know, but,” Gee said with a small shrug.

Bert sighed. “I mean I’ve been waiting for you to be home for awhile. I’ve missed you all day.” He leaned over and pressed a small kiss to the corner of Gerard’s lips, but the whiskey on Bert’s breath and coming from his skin clouded Gerard’s mind and he turned away from the kiss. Bert sat back with an expression that was slowly changing from confusion to sadness. “Why won’t you kiss me?”

Bert’s words had a heaviness to them as they hung in the silence of the bedroom. “You’re upset with me,” he said finally, his tone carrying a bit of what Gerard could tell was annoyance, which in turn made himself annoyed, also.

“No, Bert. It’s fine. It’s really nothing.”

“It’s pretty obviously not nothing,” Bert replied in an exasperated tone, shifting on the bed to face the other, “You’re mad about the coke, aren’t you? Because you said before that it was fine.”

Gerard sighed and pressed the tips of his fingers into his forehead. “I know what I—it’s not about the coke.”

“Well then please spell it out for me because I’m obviously not understanding something, maybe it’s because I’m just so high I can’t get it through my alcoholic fucking skull.”

Gerard dropped his jaw incredulously and stood up from the mattress, irritated that he now needed to drop his pretense of not fighting. He really didn’t have the energy to have this conversation for the millionth time. “Oh my fucking god, Bert, I just wish you would act like you were even a tiny bit supportive of me for even one fucking second, that’s really all and you don’t have to act like a douchebag, and by the way, I have literally never called you an alcoholic.”

“Yeah and probably on purpose, but you’ve done a pretty good fucking job at implying it. How have I not been supportive of you, Gee?”

“Don’t fucking call me that right now! I just don’t want to come home everyday and have to do fucking breathing exercises to stop myself from doing drugs at my own house.”

Bert rolled his eyes. “Well first of all, it’s my apartment and you can go to yours anytime you fucking want. Second, maybe if you did do drugs when you got home, we’d have something else to talk about for the past six fucking weeks besides you being sober. I do support you, but I already told you that I’m not coming along for the fucking ride because I’m not like you.”

Gerard just stared at Bert for a few seconds before turning away to rummage around the room for his backpack and beginning to pack any clothes of his that he could find.

“What—what are you doing?” Bert demanded with a huff.

“Going to my place, because you’re right. And maybe you’re right about us, too. Maybe getting fucked up is the only thing we have in common, at least it’s pretty clear that’s how you feel.”

“Fine, then fucking go. Find someone who’s sober, too, and you guys can talk about how fucking awful it is to be shitfaced anytime you want, happy fucking ending,” Bert spat, grabbing the whiskey bottle from his feet and chugging for multiple seconds, “Have fun.”

Gerard let out a sardonic laugh as he continued to dig through drawers and scour the messy floor for his stuff. “Nice. I’m really glad to know that you’d trade the last two years for a fucking line, Bert. Glad none of this meant anything to you except having a drug buddy.” 

Bert scoffed and grabbed a pack of cigarettes from the nightstand, lighting one up and laying back on the mattress. “Why do you have to twist my fucking words like that, Gerard? You know that’s not what I meant.”

“Well then what did you mean?” Gee fired back, zipping up his bag and pulling it onto his shoulders as he turned back to Bert, “Because I don’t think I ever really know anymore. You pretty much said it yourself, we don’t understand each other anymore. You’re not the person I fell in love with or maybe I’m no longer the person that fell in love, but it doesn’t really matter.”

Bert got quiet and left his cigarette to burn for a long time. Gerard saw the tell-tale signs on the other’s face that he was trying to hold back tears and that really broke his heart; he’d probably only seen Bert cry one other time.

“I can’t—“ Bert started, his voice cracking, “I can’t do this anymore. Just get the fuck out of here.”

Gerard stood still for a moment, studying the younger man’s face. Bert wouldn’t even look at him.

Then he turned around, heart in his stomach, and he didn’t look back.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Are we pretending that Quinn is still in the band? Why yes, we are indeed. If you have a problem with it, you can call 1-800-tears4joey

**Present Day**

Bert could see the pink light of day behind his eyelids but he was so comfortable that he didn’t dare move a muscle. Most people complained about sleeping on the bus but he’d always gotten the best sleep, especially if they were moving. Something about the motion all but rocked him to sleep like a baby and after a few months of not having that, he felt glorious. He could tell that they were still moving so he figured he couldn’t have slept too late, but through his morning haze, he couldn’t remember when they were supposed to get in. The sheets felt warm against his skin and he was reminded of Gerard’s fingertips on his arms, on his chest. He didn’t fully understand it, but being near Gerard gave him this dual feeling like a full body high but also like there was a rock in his stomach. Last night had been like a fever dream, one he’d actually had before, which was the strangest part. 

He finally opened his eyes just a little, testing, to see the stream of light coming into his bunk from the cracked curtain. Reaching his hand up to the little shelf behind his pillow, he grabbed his phone to check the time and it lit up to a text from Gerard from last night regarding his playlist. 

_Now That You’re Dead, Bert??? Really? That’s dark, asshole ;P_

He let out a laugh which sounded muffled in the small space and broke the silence enough to convince him to get out of bed, responding to the text before pulling the curtain aside.

_Wrote it when I found out mcr was breaking up. Warned you some of them were angry, sue me_

Bert wished for a fraction of a moment that he knew how to type that weird emoji made of punctuation with the “oh well” hands because maybe that would make Gerard laugh and then he realized how fucking stupid that was, and why was a stupid text about nothing important to someone he knew so well making him so overanalytical anyway? A feeling of annoyance began to settle over him as he climbed over the edge of his bunk and the mood was quite settled by the time his feet met the floor.

The kitchenette at the front of the bus sounded quiet and he assumed everyone was still asleep as he made his way down the hallway, one hand on the wall to steady himself as the vehicle barreled down the highway. He was surprised, however, to find Quinn there sitting on the small couch and drinking from a white styrofoam cup, an open book in his other hand. The other man looked up when he heard Bert’s footsteps and held up his cup a bit in greeting. “Morning. There’s coffee in the pot if you want.”

“I want,” Bert responded, his voice still thick from sleep. He grabbed a cup from its plastic packaging in one of the upper cabinets and poured coffee for himself before joining Quinn on the couch. “Thank you,” he added, rubbing his eyes with his free hand. 

Quinn simply hummed his response in the affirmative as he returned his focus to the page he was reading. 

Bert quietly sipped his coffee for a few minutes and stared out the window at the passing trees by the side of the highway, trying to kick his salty mood, until finally he heard some shuffling from somewhere down the bus. Jeph emerged moments later from behind the curtain separating the two areas, looking disheveled by sleep and heading straight for the electric kettle to make tea. Once he clicked it on, he turned to lean against the counter, his eyes surveying the room and Quinn’s book before landing on Bert. 

“You’re up early,” Jeph remarked, pushing a hand through his unruly hair. Bert knitted his brows at the bassist in confusion and took a sip of his coffee. “I heard someone coming in at like 4am and I figured it was you since I hadn’t seen you around.”

“Dude, 4am? Where even were you all night? I just thought you crashed early after I saw you last,” Quinn added, closing his book in his lap.

Bert carefully considered a response. It wasn’t a crime to talk to someone all night, but somehow it felt like a secret, or at least something that was only his to know, like telling them would ruin it. He was annoyed that they were even asking, and the fact that he was again over analyzing the situation was annoying him even more. Why would it be a secret? It wasn’t a secret. 

“Jesus, I was just talking to Gee, it’s not a big deal. I’ll make sure to share my location with you guys so you can keep tabs on me at all times, yeah?” he answered just short of snapping, which he immediately realized was an unfair result of his shitty mood. “Sorry,” he added quickly, shrugging, “Yeah, we were just hanging out and lost track of time.”

Quinn raised his eyebrows and made brief eye contact with Jeph who quickly turned back around to fix his tea, but neither of them dared to say anything.

Bert sighed and picked his cigarettes up from the countertop beside him, pulling one out and clamping it between his lips. “Do you guys mind if I smoke? We have another three hours until St. Paul.”

“Fine with me,” Quinn answered, Jeph nodding in the corner, “Seems like you need one.” Bert could tell that Quinn was trying to get him to talk with that one but he wasn’t going to talk because there was nothing to talk about. He lit his cigarette and offered one to Quinn, but the other man shook his head, so he tossed the box back up onto the counter and leaned back into the couch cushions. Quinn was studying him carefully and Bert just knew he was about to ask some dumb question, and as if on queue, he did. “Did you two get in a fight or something? What’s up with you? I thought you guys were all right.” 

“No,” he replied with a curt laugh, because he wasn’t expecting that to have been the question, which actually made him feel a little better. He took a long drag of his cigarette before continuing, “No, we didn’t fight. We’re actually getting along pretty well. He just...makes me feel...some type of way. Pisses me off.”

Quinn furrowed his brow and shifted his gaze past Bert to try to somehow create clarity of his nonsense. “So let me get this straight. You guys are getting along, so much so that you stayed up all night talking, and that...makes you mad?”

Bert sighed again, remembering for the millionth time in the twenty years he’d known his band mates that they knew him too well for him to be able to mask his emotions, regardless of whether or not he wanted to keep them under wraps.

“He just...has this control over me. He always has. But with the way we ended things...“ he paused and took another drag of his cigarette, “I don’t know. I mean we talked it out and it’s fine but he said some stuff to me that night he left that made me think for sure he wouldn’t be able to make me feel like this anymore. I mean it was almost fifteen years ago and I still remember it clear as day. But he still does.” 

The other two men were quiet for a few moments. Jeph picked up his tea and sat at the small table across from them, looking up at Bert in contemplation. “Well,” Jeph began, biting absentmindedly at his lip ring, “Coming from someone who’s been on the outside of this looking in for a long time— and you know I don’t like to get involved, so I mean you can take this with a grain of salt if you want, Bert— but you know I’ve seen the drunken fights and the drug-induced hysterias, and I’ve sat through years and years of your angry songwriting and the shows and shows and shows of getting the crowd to flip the bird during Take It Away and it just...well it just seems to me like after all of that you guys deserve to give your friendship another shot. And don’t take this the wrong way but it sounds like you’re still holding onto the grudge a little when you really don’t have to anymore, especially if you guys have talked it out.” He paused a moment to sip his tea. “And so if he makes you feel...some type of way, as you said, then maybe you should try to let it all go and just go with it. It could be a good thing.”

Bert sighed, avoiding eye contact with Jeph but knowing he was probably right. “Well...if the position for Dalaï Lama ever opens up, you should apply,” Bert responded with a grin, reaching his leg across the aisle to kick Jeph in the thigh.

Jeph recovered and simply sipped his tea with a shit-eating grin, Quinn now looking at his phone and clearly trying to stifle the same grin. The assholes probably assumed more about Bert’s escapades last night than they were letting up.

“It’s been a long time, huh?” Quinn surmised, “It’s good touring with them again. I like those guys.”

Bert sipped his coffee and glanced at his phone to check for messages from Gerard— none yet— and then back to the window. “Yeah, I like them too.”

—

Later that night, Bert watched Gerard from side-stage wave goodbye to the crowd and stride off stage straight toward him. His heart was already buzzing in his chest like he’d had too much caffeine and its speed increased once the older man’s gaze locked onto his own. Gee’s eyes were still dark with wild energy from performing and as he got closer, Bert could see the beginnings of a smirk on the corners of his lips.

Due to the soundcheck schedule, catering logistics, and media interviews, he hadn’t seen Gerard since last night, but they had been texting all day...the sort of texting that makes a man’s breath hitch in his throat. If it weren’t for Jeph’s speech this morning, he probably would have been mad that Gee had the power to make him hard through a text as he was not normally the sexting type. In all honesty, he usually wasn’t very attached to his phone, even on tour, but today he’d slaved over it like Gerard’s next message would give him life, and he’d been distracted beyond repair; he was surprised he even remembered to keep singing his own songs during their set. Now that the man behind the messages was finally approaching him, his mouth failed him and went dry.

Gerard took the last step toward him and briefly fingered a string bracelet on Bert’s arm before wrapping his fingertips gently around his wrist. He was standing so close that their bodies were almost touching, one of his feet planted between Bert’s so that when the taller man leaned in toward the other’s ear to make himself heard over the din of the venue around them, Bert was only aware of Gee’s hip pressing lightly against the tightness in his shorts that’d been there all day. “You were watching me again.”

Bert swallowed and let out a breath against Gerard’s jawline. “Not you, your band.”

Gerard released a curt laugh and squeezed Bert’s wrist a little tighter. “You were watching me.” Before the younger man had a chance to respond, he was being led away back behind the stage and then pulled into an alcove filled with equipment. Gerard pushed him into a corner behind a large shelf and they attacked each other eagerly in the dark, hands frantically exploring skin. Bert forced himself to leave Gerard’s lips just to catch his breath, but he found as he placed quick kisses down the other’s neck that it kept coming up short because all he could smell was Gerard’s skin and it was suffocating and intoxicating all at once. He sucked hard at the base of the other’s neck, savoring the salty taste of Gerard’s skin and the groans that fell from his lips.

Gerard unbuttoned Bert’s shorts and pulled the zipper, suddenly slowing his movements and causing Bert to pause as well. He leveled his gaze with Bert’s as he wrapped a hand around the other’s cock, eliciting a soft moan from the younger man. “All day long,” he whispered, nipping once at Bert’s earlobe and moving his hand slowly along his length, “All I could think about was sucking your cock.”

Bert watched Gee deliriously as he lowered himself to his knees and looked up at him. “Goddamn,” Bert muttered, tangling his fingers in Gerard’s hair. He stared as the other man flicked his tongue out to the head and swirled it around ever so lightly, driving him out of his fucking mind and he had to use everything he had in him not to thrust straight into Gee’s mouth— he knew it had been awhile since Gerard had done this and he knew he couldn’t handle that, but it was so hard not to. “Fuck, Gerard, please, I can’t—“ he whined, taking in a sharp breath seconds later when the other man’s lips suddenly closed over his cock.

As Gerard fell into a rhythm, Bert couldn’t for his own life take his eyes off of him, and at one point when Gee looked up at him with watery eyes, he wasn’t sure how long he was even going to last. Between having had a semi pretty much all day and the way Gee looked so fucking pretty down there, his ability to hold himself back was dwindling by the second. When he saw Gerard using his free hand to pull his own hard-on from his jeans, he knew he was going to lose it soon.

“Gee, I’m gonna…” Bert warned, pulling gently at Gerard’s hair in case he wanted to pull off, but the other man held tight at the base of his cock, stroking his own quickly. Bert felt like his fucking knees were going to give out beneath him and the air was starting to feel thinner, and then he had to remind himself to be quiet because he was coming into Gerard’s mouth hard and fast and Gee was _swallowing_ it like a pro and goddamn if it wasn’t the hottest thing Bert had ever seen in his life, and though he had difficulty even keeping his eyes open, it was worth it. Once the other man was still sucking him off gently through the end of his climax, Bert dropped to his knees and swatted Gerard’s hand from his own length, taking over for him and attacking his mouth feverishly with his own.

Suddenly there was a sound of footsteps approaching dangerously close to them and they both jumped, Bert pulling away and slapping a hand over Gerard’s mouth, but he did not stop moving his other hand along Gee’s cock, much to Gerard’s chagrin. Gee widened his eyes at him before submitting again and suffering his approach to climax in silence. Whoever it was thankfully turned on no lights and there was only a brief rattling of equipment being pulled away before the footsteps receded, and that’s when Gee exploded, hot onto Bert’s hand. He wasn’t quite as quiet as Bert had been and let out a soft groan of Bert’s name, which would have made Bert hard again if he weren’t still shaking from his come-down. He gave a few more twists of his hand before letting go and then looked the other man straight in the eyes as he sucked Gerard’s come off of the spots it had landed on his hand. Gee’s lips fell open a bit as he watched and when Bert was done, he reached behind the younger man’s neck and pulled him in for another kiss. “How are you so hot?” Gerard asked incredulously as he began to button his jeans.

Bert let out a breathy laugh and buttoned his own shorts. “Good lord made me this way.” He leaned against the cement wall behind him and sighed contentedly. “Fuck, I don’t know how I’m gonna go two days without touching you. You’ve made me into an addict again.”

Their next show was a fourteen hour drive to Toronto and My Chem was playing a festival the next day between the two dates, so Bert had two days off and miles of time to fill. At the very least, they were getting hotel rooms tonight while MCR drove off to Chicago for their festival, which would be nice.

Gerard leaned back on his hands and stared at Bert with an inquisitive expression.

“What?” Bert asked, really wishing he could light a cigarette in here.

“Come with me to Chicago.”

“What? And give up my hotel shower? Yeah right, pal.”

“Come on, I’m serious. We’re still going to a hotel, just tomorrow night instead, you can have your shower then,” Gerard quipped, watching the gears turning in Bert’s head, “And we can fuck all night on a hotel bed.”

“But we’ll have to sleep in your bunk tonight. Isn’t that kind of...gay?”

Gerard laughed and whacked Bert’s shoulder. “We’ve done it before and it’s never been that bad. It’s tight but it’s big enough.”

“Yeah except I’m not twenty-three anymore. I like to sprawl out, I’m a sprawler now,” Bert responded, stretching his arms wide as if to demonstrate.

“Dude, just say yes, it’ll be fun. I want to hang out. Plus you can watch me side-stage at RiotFest,” Gee added with a smirk.

“You mean I can watch _your band_.”

“Whatever helps you sleep at night, Bert, just come with us. We can get deep-dish pizza at the hotel.”

“That’s disgusting,” Bert said with a grimace, forcing his tired legs to move so he could stand, “I have to get out of here so I can smoke. There’s no come on me right?”

Gerard stood up too and scanned his eyes over Bert’s clothes. “I’ll only tell you if you say yes.”

Bert rolled his eyes. “Okay fine. But no deep-dish. It’s only cheese. That’s gross.”

“Fine. And yeah, you have some right there,” Gerard pointed to a spot on Bert’s chest and flicked his chin when the other man looked down. 

Bert couldn’t believe he fell for that one.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Enclosed is a small gift for those of us who now must wait a whole ENTIRE YEAR for the mcr show. U and ur families are in my thoughts and prayers.

When Bert woke up the next morning in a bunk that didn’t look like his own, it took him a few moments to remember where he was. Gerard was next to him on his side with his back against the wall, his left knee bent and resting on the other’s thigh and a hand on Bert’s chest. Bert shifted his head slowly to look over at the sleeping man next to him, being careful not to move too quickly and risk waking him. He felt a little bad that Gee was so squeezed against the wall of the bunk but he seemed comfortable enough and he’d been right— they were used to this, even if it’d been awhile. In fact, after having to maneuver fucking in the bunk last night— multiple times— they had both fallen asleep pretty quickly. The position in which they were sleeping was even the same way they’d always used to sleep. This realization came to Bert as he stared at Gerard’s sleeping form, watching his bare chest move with his breath. It felt nice to be able to fall back into the good patterns so easily and without thought but it made him nervous about the bad patterns.

_You’re not the person I fell in love with, or maybe I’m no longer the person that fell in love._

The words were still held deep inside his body like scar tissue; he could release his grudge, and on Jeph’s advice, he had, but Gerard’s parting words all those years ago would most likely never leave him, mostly because Bert could never forget the pain he felt after hearing them. Even through the haze of the drugs he’d been on at the time, the sharpness cut through him like a knife and the pain and shock lingered for a long time after. Of course he’d been through breakups but this one had been particularly rough on him, and none since had been as hard. When they’d been together, he wasn’t even close to thinking about marriage but he definitely felt comfortable in their relationship, although they’d never actually defined it. Perhaps, on some level, he felt guilty for not getting sober sooner, and knew now that he had been more in the wrong than Gerard had in that last fight. Maybe that’s why Gerard’s words constantly echoed in his head, and as his eyes trained absentmindedly on the other’s eyelashes, he found himself wondering if he was good enough for Gee. Of course, at the end of the tour, it didn’t even matter because they both had wives and families, and even if he were to look past that, he lived in Australia for christsakes, 7500 miles and an entire ocean away from LA.

But he’d be damned if he couldn’t admit that the dark-haired man sleeping beside him was truly a sight to behold. Even as Gerard had aged, his facial features were still just as devastatingly beautiful as ever. Gee’s hand was warm on his chest and he selfishly wished that they could just stay here like this. He at least got a few minutes before Gerard began to shift and finally opened his eyes, catching Bert’s immediately.

Gerard smiled softly, his eyes blinking heavily at the other. “Were you watching me sleep?” His voice was thick with sleep and it made Bert smile back at him.

“No, I was watching your band,” Bert quipped, leaning in and pressing a soft kiss to Gee’s forehead, which suddenly felt too intimate and made his face feel hot.

Gerard released a one-sound, sleepy chuckle and nuzzled his face a little more into the crook of the other’s neck, which made Bert feel less weird. “This is nice,” Gee mumbled. Bert hummed in agreement, bringing an arm up around the other’s shoulder and pulling him in a bit when Gee lifted his head onto his chest. “I’m glad you came with us. Did you tell anyone on your bus or did you just peace?”

“I told Quinn, he was there when I went back to get clothes. He seemed equally distressed that I was giving up a hotel shower.”

“I think you’re both being a little dramatic, we’ve only been touring for two days.”

“You gotta get it when you can get it,” Bert replied with a shrug of his free shoulder.

Gerard reached up above their heads to check the time on his phone. “It’s pretty late, we’re probably gonna pull up soon. We should get dressed.”

“ _You_ should get dressed, I could stay here all day if I wanted. The people need to hear Welcome to the Black Parade, and last I checked, I don’t play the tambourine for MCR,” Bert responded, twisting his body slightly in a stretch.

“That could be fun, though. We could give you a tamb solo,” Gee said, his voice muffled as he dug through the shelves behind their heads for clothes. He placed a pair of boxers on Bert’s stomach. “For you, I know your clothes are in the back lounge.”

Bert shimmied into the boxers and turned on his side, placing a hand on Gerard’s lower back and running his fingers gently along the skin there as Gee dug through his stuff.

When the older man finally found what he was looking for, he started pulling clothes on, contorting his limbs strangely to get into them in the small space. “Actually, you could do ‘Prison’ with us if you want. The crowd would lose it.”

“Yeah, sure, if everyone’s cool with it.”

Gerard nodded and pushed gently at Bert’s shoulder. “Are you planning on letting me out?”

“Maybe. For a price,” Bert replied, puckering his lips. Gerard stared at him for a moment and placed his hand on the side of Bert’s face, running his thumb gently over Bert’s lips. Bert felt a twinge from inside his boxers and told it to go away, that this was not the time and Gerard was about to go be professional, but the twinge did not listen to him. 

Gerard sat up to straddle him and leaned in for the kiss, the crotch of his jeans pressing against the thin material of Bert’s boxers, and he bit gently at Bert’s bottom lip as he pulled away. “Later. Hotel bed,” he whispered before climbing over him and crawling out of the bunk. 

Bert sighed and laid still for a few minutes, trying to will away his semi before eventually giving up and crawling out. He headed back to the lounge to grab clothes but noticed that the door was closed, and as he got closer, he could hear hushed tones from behind it. He didn’t want to eavesdrop, especially because this wasn’t even his bus, but he also needed clothes. He waited a respectful distance from the door and could still make out some of the conversation, although not enough to piece anything together or whoever it was in there. It definitely sounded like a fight of sorts and he knew tensions on the bus could be high sometimes but damn, after only two days of tour? He was glad his band operated for the most part in a drama-free manner.

He waited for a few more minutes and even went to the bathroom before anyone came out. Bert felt the bus come to a stop and was grateful that he’d be able to smoke soon; he was considering trying to find some of Gerard’s clothes to wear instead so he could at least leave the bus, but as the thought occurred to him, the door to the lounge burst open and Frank emerged. Before Bert could even as much as nod a hello in his direction, he’d already slipped past him as if Bert wasn’t even there, and a minute later, he heard the electronic opening of the bus doors. The next person out of the room, to Bert’s surprise, was Gerard, who looked pale—paler than usual, that is. His eyes were a little glassy and his breathing was quick and shallow, and Bert could tell that he was trying to hold back tears but if he wasn’t careful, he was going to give himself a panic attack.

Bert put a hand on Gerard’s chest and steadied him against the wall. He mimed deep breathing for a few minutes and Gerard followed, eventually sighing and pulling cigarettes from his pocket with a questioning look at Bert. The younger man jogged into the lounge for clothes and dressed quickly, joining Gee outside within a minute.

Gerard was leaning against the bus next to the door, a cig already lit between his middle and forefinger. Bert followed suit but kept his eyes locked on Gee’s as he pulled his own out of his pocket. “So what was that? Are you like, okay?” He asked through clamped lips on the cigarette he was lighting, the lighter failing multiple times before achieving success.

Gee took a long drag before replying, his eyes looking, unfocused, into the distance. “I’m fine. Don’t worry about it,” he said, his tone flat.

Bert furrowed his brows. “You don’t look fine. We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want, but I might be able to help. I know it’s been awhile since you’ve been a touring band; I know it can be rough.”

Gerard let out a sarcastic laugh. “It’s not that. I really wish it was.”

“Okay, well...Frank seemed mad. He didn’t even say a word to me.”

Gerard sighed and dragged on his cigarette. “Frank didn’t know you were coming with us. I forgot to tell him because we didn’t see him last night, but I didn’t think anything of it. I didn’t think it would be a big deal.”

“Is it a big deal?” Bert asked, trying to think of some past offense he could have committed against Frank.

“Well...I asked him what he thought about you singing with us tonight and he freaked out because it only took him about half a second to realize we’re…” Gee trailed off and kicked frustratedly at a pebble on the pavement.

“Touring together? Which was his idea in the first place?”

“No! I mean, yeah it was, but,” Gerard finally looked up at him, gesturing wildly with his cigarette hand, “He didn’t think we would...hook up. He thought we were just gonna like, exchange pleasantries and avoid each other all tour, and he proposed it because he knew that the fans would like it.”

Bert remained confused, taking a drag on his cigarette and staring at Gerard.

“It’s honestly so stupid, I feel like you’re just gonna laugh at me.”

“Gee, I’m not gonna laugh at you. You almost just had a panic attack,” Bert replied with a look of concern.

“We had a thing, too. Me and Frank.”

“Wait...what?” If Bert had been expecting something, that certainly hadn’t been it. 

“After you and I broke up, he helped me work through some shit and it just kind of happened. We didn’t tell anyone and we stopped when Frank got married, so it was short. Jamia’s not as cool about stuff as Lynz is, and I don’t blame her or anything but I never even took Lynz up on it since then anyway, and so I guess it was sort of an unwritten pact between me and Frank in a way,” Gee paused and bit gently at the inside of his cheek, “At least that’s sort of what it feels like now that he’s pissed off at me.”

Bert considered this for a few moments. “You didn’t take her up on it...until now,” he emphasized, starting to understand. Gerard nodded solemnly, taking a last drag from his nub of a cigarette before tossing it on the ground and stamping it out. “So Frank’s like, in love with you and somehow I’m some kind of homewrecker even though he’s not even allowed to fuck you? Am I missing anything there?”

Gerard laughed and shook his head, lighting another cigarette— if there were any appropriate time for chainsmoking, it was always tour. “I knew you’d think it was dumb. It sounds dumb when you say it. I just think like...okay here’s the thing, I don’t know this for sure, so just keep that in mind, but I kinda don’t think Frank’s happy in his marriage. Like, the difference in his mood from when we were rehearsing last year to when we all came out of quarantine was crazy.”

“Isn’t that true for everyone though? That was shit,” Bert snickered, stamping out his cigarette nub and following Gee’s lead in lighting another.

“I mean yeah, but this was different. And I know it’s only been two days but I’ve seen him flat out ignore FaceTime calls from her when he’s not even doing anything on the bus. I know he loves his kids and I don’t think he’ll ever leave her because of that but I think he sort of feels like...like he thought he and I were in the same situation and that made him feel better but now it’s clear to him that we’re not.”

Gee lifted his leg and rested his foot against the side of the bus, studying the end of his cigarette. “I think what bothers me the most is that he’s my best friend, and I think finding out about us this morning just made him feel kind of alone. I guess it just hurts that I made him feel that way. I don’t know.”

Bert studied the other man’s movements as he thought this over, trying to think of a way to ask what he wanted to ask without sounding inconsiderate. “Did you know before that he felt that way about you?”

Gerard shrugged. “I guess I did but I never really thought too much about it because I didn’t realize he wasn’t happy with Jamia until recently. I just don’t really think of him that way. I almost feel bad for leading him on in the first place. Being with him was just comfortable, I mean we know each other so well. But I don’t know, he’s just...he’s just Frank, you know? Maybe this is mean but it wasn’t even hard when we cut it off. Not as hard as…” Gee cleared his throat and broke eye contact with Bert, “Not as hard as it was with you.”

Bingo. Bert swallowed and ran a hand through his hair, not really certain what to do with himself. “So...you are to Frank as...I am to you?” He asked quietly, finding the courage to look at Gee again.

Gerard’s eyes found Bert’s and he just stared for what felt like a long time. He grabbed Bert’s free hand and studied the lines on the other’s palm, running his thumb gently over Bert’s wrist as he took a drag from the cigarette in his other hand. Finally, and almost imperceptibly, he nodded, but he might as well have lit Bert’s heart on fire.

“You’ve always been in the back of my mind, Bert. Sometimes you’re all I can think about.”


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had a lot of fun writing this chapter for more reasons than one and I hope you’ll see why. Peace n blessins <3

Later that day, Bert stomached his way through ‘Prison’ with the guys, even though he felt weird about it after this morning, but Gerard had insisted it was fine— for Frank to make a scene about it with Mikey and Ray after they’d both already agreed to it would mean he’d also have to explain the whole thing to them, and Gerard knew he wouldn’t do that. Frank had simply pretended Bert didn’t exist on stage, which wasn’t the worst he could have done, but still, Bert was grateful the experience only lasted three minutes. He wanted to watch the rest of the show but he also wanted to be respectful of Frank’s feelings; he didn’t really understand them after all, but it was his stage and he knew from experience that a show was sometimes the best way to work out bad energy, which may be difficult to do if the source of your bad energy is twenty feet away. Bert was actively trying not to have negative feelings toward Frank because he sort of felt bad for the dude but the fact that he’d been fully ignored by him all day, accompanied by his slowly growing feelings for Gerard were making it difficult. It’s not like Gee was Frank’s fucking property; he was a grown man who could make his own decisions and if Frank was really the “best friend” that Gerard claimed he was, he would understand that.

Not to mention, it was fucking hot outside, and after the quarantined summer of no shows, he’d forgotten what it was like to be at a festival. It was September for christsake, shouldn’t it be at least a little cooler this close to autumn? And yet everyone around him seemed stoked about it, drinking to celebrate, which was bothering him more than usual today. On top of that, the one person he wanted to talk to was busy almost all afternoon. Even after their set, Gerard had a two hour long signing and countless interviews with various media outlets. He followed him around all day like a lost puppy just to steal mere moments with him and force-feed him water between his various commitments, spending the rest of his time watching the older man answer the same questions over and over again to different interviewers.

He was relieved when it was finally time to leave and he could have just about cried when he laid eyes upon their hotel room. It wasn’t that late since they hadn’t stayed through the entirety of the festival, and they actually had a whole day off between now and when they had to leave for Toronto, so they had a fair amount of time to relax, which wasn’t usually the case. After they’d put their bags down, Bert flopped on a bed and agreed to let Gee shower first; the original plan had obviously been to shower together but after the long, hot day they’d both had, they needed a little space to clean up on their own. On any other day, he would have fought Gee tooth and nail to shower first, but after hitting the mattress, he gave in easily, mostly because he didn’t want to get up, but he found the motivation when he decided to go outside for a smoke.

He yelled to Gee over the din of the shower to let him know and headed downstairs with a cigarette already clamped between his lips. After being inside in the air conditioning for a few minutes, the wall of humidity that hit him when he stepped outside almost made him lose his breath. “God, it sucks out here,” he exclaimed, mostly to himself but partially to the other gentleman who was sitting on the bench there, absentmindedly making smoker-small-talk. When he sat down on the bench and turned to look at the man, he realized with a sense of dread that it was Frank.

“Trust me, sucks in there, too,” Frank replied, his body hunched forward, elbows resting on his knees and head in one hand as he smoked.

Bert cleared his throat and focused his eyes on the pavement beneath them, the silence just as heavy as the humidity. He had to say something, literally anything. “I’m uh…sorry if I overstepped by coming with you guys. Gee said it was chill, so I just…I’m sorry if you feel like I’ve invaded your space.”

A laugh exploded from Frank that made Bert jump a bit. “Oh, well if Gee said—“ he sat up and slapped his thigh, the sound echoing under the hotel’s overhang, “if Gee said it was chill, then nooo problem, water under the bridge, buddy.”

Now that he was sitting up, Bert could see that Frank’s cheeks were a little pink, his eyes glazed over. At his feet sat one of those styrofoam coffee cups they give you in hotel rooms filled with what looked like water, but Bert could safely assume it was not. 

“Hey!” Frank gasped and looked straight at Bert, furrowing his brows and leaning in closer as if he were going to tell a secret but speaking in the same volume as before. “Hey, you know what? Do you want to know why I was so SO excited for this tour? I was like, oh man Frank, this is great, it’s gonna be so goo—so great? And the, the um...the people...the ticket people, the um, the fans! They’re gonna be...great! And you’re gonna...you’re gonna hang out with Gerard the whole fuckin...the whole fuckin tour! And then, well, but then you’re here, too, and Gerard...well, fuck I mean, shit! Yeah, Gerard loves you, I mean he might be like IN love with you but I don’t know, what do I know.”

Bert raised his eyebrows, trying not to laugh. He wasn’t sure if he should even engage; from the looks of it, the chances of anything he said being remembered by Frank tomorrow were slim, anyway. “You’re pretty sloshed, pal. Have you had any water today?”

Frank jutted his head back incredulously and just stared at Bert for a moment. “I am not your pal, no sir. No siree,” he reached down to the ground to grab his cup and chugged its remnants, wincing as it went down and chasing it with a drag of his cigarette, “I don’t even...I never even smoke now but I bought a pack today because you know, it doesn’t even matter. It doesn’t! You know what, I just—“ Frank sighed dramatically, clumsily pushing a strand of hair from his face, “I cannot— CANNOT—- believe how much mess I had to clean up. Gerard, oh man, Gerard. That sweet, small, and precious baby boy. He is so nice. He is the nicest person ever in...in the whole world! That I have ever even seen. And you know who was there to clean it all up? Me! I was. He was a big, gynan...jeegint...gi-nan-tic mess. Gi-nan-tic mess! He was crying for like, seven million hours, just didn’t stop crying, I was like wow how many tears in the world are there but no, there’s more tears, look at that. And he wanted to drink, he wanted to so bad! I had to say, no hey Gerard you are sober, so no drinks for you okay? Had to say it all the time, watch him sometimes. One time he even bought a drug! I don’t...I don’t even know what drugs it was…but I had to take it away. I had to flush them in the...in the toilet. He was VERY mad at me for that. But I had to. He was very sad. And because of you. It was from you. He wanted to call you all the time, too. But I said to him, I said, Gerard, if you...if you call Bert, you will just be sad again some other time and...and you will do drugs, do you want that? Is that what you want to do? And it was not. I actually think...I think actually you probably are why he relasped. Relasp. Relaps. So. So I can’t believe he is fucking you again. It must be good, and that’s all I can think. You must have like...the biggest dick ever. The biggest dick in the world. Ha! You ARE the biggest dick in the...in the world. So that is funny, isn’t it.”

At that moment, the sound of the sliding doors of the hotel’s lobby pulled them out of their one-sided conversation and Gerard emerged, hair falling in wet strands around his face and a cigarette being lit between his lips.

“Oh my god look who it is!” Frank exclaimed, standing up suddenly and staggering a bit, “Gee, we were talking about you and now here you are!”

“Jesus,” Gerard muttered through an exhale of smoke, leaning against the brick wall and studying Frank carefully.

“Gerard! Does Bert have a big dick because...because I just want to know? And is he like, nice now? He seems kinda nice but,” he put his hand up to his mouth to block his lips from Bert’s view, “Is it TRUE nice? I am not sure. I am—“ Frank took a step in Gerard’s direction and tripped over his feet, crashing to the ground with a groan.

Bert sighed and looked up at Gee, who tossed his cigarette to the ground and made his way to Frank. Bert did the same and helped Gerard lift the smaller man up off the ground, each of them throwing one of Frank’s arms around their shoulders and heading for the door. Frank hung his head down, chin to his chest, and mumbled under his breath, barely moving his feet. Once inside the elevator, Gerard stabbed the button for their floor and leaned Frank against the wall.

“What’s your room number, Frankie?” Gerard asked, craning his neck to catch Frank’s eye.

“Um...six-twenty-...one? Six-twenty-two? Or maybe thirty-two? I cannot...I do not rember,” Frank mumbled, closing his eyes and resting his head against the elevator wall. 

Gerard sighed and patted down Frank’s pockets, looking for his room key but to no avail. He looked up at Bert with an apologetic expression, and Bert knew immediately what he meant by it. Bert rolled his eyes as the elevator slid open and lifted Frank up again, the two of them dragging the drunken man down the hall.

Once in their room, they dropped Frank onto the spare bed, Bert pulling their suitcases onto the floor while Gee pulled off Frank’s shoes.

Frank lolled his head to one side. “Thisizzanot my room. Issa sleepover,” he mumbled, throwing one arm to dangle over the side of the mattress.

Bert glanced at the alarm clock on the nightstand; it was only nine pm but it might as well have been one in the morning for how tired he was now. He kicked his shoes off and entered the bathroom, pulling his shirt over his head and cracking his neck to one side and then the other. Gerard followed and closed the door behind him, pulling himself up to sit on the sink as Bert undressed to shower.

“Sorry you had to deal with that, dude. I don’t think I’ve seen him that wrecked in awhile, maybe ever,” Gerard said, leaning back against the mirror.

Bert shook his head as he unbuttoned his shorts, reaching down to turn on the water in the shower. “It’s fine. Imagine everyone having to deal with us all the time when we were like that.”

Gerard just smirked and nodded.

Bert hooked his thumbs in the waist of his shorts to pull them down, but paused and turned toward the other man, his eyes on the floor as he thought. “Hey um...I know Frank was fucked up but he made me feel pretty shitty about what I put you through. I know I’ve said it already but I’m just...I’m really sorry. I wish I could go back. I would if I could.”

Gerard slipped down from the counter and slid a hand behind Bert’s neck, the other against his chest. “I’m the one who left, Bert. I could have stayed. I could have called. You don’t have to go back. Just be here.” He pressed a kiss to Bert’s lips and pushed the other’s shorts down, gesturing toward the shower. “And be in there. You smell.”

—

Gerard woke to a sensation on his thigh and opened his eyes to a fully naked Bert sitting between his legs on the mattress, planting kisses across his hipbones and running his fingers across the skin just underneath the leg of his boxers. Gerard already had morning wood and he stretched his arms up and rested them behind his head, propping himself up a bit.

“Good morning,” Bert mumbled into his hip, smirking up at Gee. 

Gee smirked back and suddenly remembered last night’s Frank fiasco, but when he glanced over at the spare bed, Frank was gone, a pile of sheets in his wake. He briefly wondered what kind of fresh hell of a hangover he was experiencing at the moment, but his thoughts were interrupted by Bert’s roving hands on the waistband of his boxers. Bert yanked them down and devoured Gee’s bare skin like he’d been starving his entire life. Gerard watched as Bert nipped at the innermost part of his thigh and released a soft moan followed by a sharp inhale as Bert, with no warning, took his cock into his mouth.

“Fuck, Bert,” he groaned, fully awake now if he wasn’t before and lifting his hips to meet the other man’s movements. Bert fell into a rhythm for a few minutes and at one point when he looked up to meet Gerard’s eyes, he almost lost it. Suddenly, he got distracted by an idea and tugged gently on Bert’s hair. 

The younger man pulled off of him and tipped his head slightly to the side in confusion. “What’s wrong?” He asked, brows furrowed with concern.

“No, I mean, nothing, I just…” Gee lowered his voice a little, not having much confidence in what he was about to say or how Bert would react, “I wanna fuck _you_.”

Bert raised his eyebrows in surprise, his facial expression losing its sexy-Bert cool as it faded into genuine thought and perhaps a little nervousness if Gerard wasn’t mistaken. A moment later, the sexy-Bert cool returned to his face and he leaned up to straddle Gee, pressing a brief kiss to his lips before moving on to his neck. “Okay. Just be gentle. It’s been a long time,” he mumbled, nipping at Gerard’s earlobe, “Tell me how you want me.”

Gee felt light-headed as he moved his hands to grip Bert’s waist, digging his nails into the skin there and grinding up against the other’s hips; after a few moments, he wet his fingers and reached down to find Bert’s entrance, sliding a finger in slowly and turning to whisper in Bert’s ear. “I want you to sit on my fucking cock.”

The moan that came out of Bert’s mouth, low and slow in his ear, made him shudder. Gerard pulled his finger out and slowly pushed in with another, pulling them apart inside Bert and watching the other’s body language carefully. He could tell that it was taking him a little longer to adjust than he himself had, but Bert was pushing through it. Once the small sounds of pain in his ear subsided and turned into sounds of lust, Gee added a third finger and Bert gasped and ground his hips down into Gerard’s, their cocks pressing together and making Gee crazy. 

“Can’t wait to feel you inside me,” Bert groaned into Gee’s neck.

“You ready?” The older man asked, pulling his fingers out slowly and kissing Bert’s jawline.

“Mm,” Bert hummed, pressing his hips into Gerard’s again, “I want you. Fuck me, Gee, please. _Please_.”

Gerard’s breath hitched in his throat and he grabbed the base of his cock as Bert sat back a little and lined himself up, finally pressing on the head. “Go slow,” Gee said as he looked up into Bert’s eyes; he could still see the subtle nerves behind all that cool and he reached up behind Bert’s neck to pull him down, kissing him deeply. He felt Bert smile into their kiss and then push down slowly onto his cock. Gerard gasped and bit the inside of his cheek to stop himself from thrusting up into Bert. Once Bert was entirely down, he took a few moments to adjust, sitting up and resting his hands on Gee’s stomach. When he was ready, Bert lifted up and back down, the slow burn driving Gerard wild and the heat building inside of him like a firework about to blow. 

He reached out and wrapped his hand around Bert’s cock, partially to distract himself from how slowly Bert was moving and partially to speed the other man along so he didn’t look like the loser who came too soon. As Bert began to increase his speed into a rhythm, Gerard matching it with his strokes, he tipped his head back and moaned, a beautifully uninhibited noise that seemed to Gee like he’d only just realized they were alone. Minutes passed and Gerard couldn’t stop staring at the beautifully sculpted man bouncing on top of him, Gee’s lips parted slightly in pure awe of the sight. He started to feel Bert’s muscles contracting around his cock, which only pushed him closer to the edge, and he pulled faster along the other’s length. Bert’s breath came quicker and his moans louder until suddenly he was exploding onto Gerard’s stomach and _screaming_ Gee’s name, and Gerard felt like he was going to pass out from the sight of it before finally blowing his load into Bert as he was still shaking through his own climax.

As they came down, Bert leaned down onto Gerard’s chest, breathing heavily, his various spent body parts twitching from the aftershock every few seconds. Gerard wrapped his arms around Bert, running his fingertips gently over the other’s back; his skin was sticky with sweat but Gee didn’t mind. Bert smelled like a combination of sex and hotel soap and the sweetness of his skin that was only Bert’s, and Gee felt like he could get high from breathing it in, felt like he _was_ high. His cock was still inside Bert and he could feel the other’s muscles contracting every few seconds, threatening to make him actually pass out from the oversensitivity.

“Fuck, babe, you really gotta get off of me,” Gerard said, jumping a little from another contraction of Bert’s muscles around him.

“But I like it. I wanna stay. What, like you don’t have another one in you?” Bert mumbled, kissing Gee’s chest.

Gerard laughed, shoving his shoulder. “I’m going to literally kill you if you don’t get off of me this instant and I will not possibly be able to be held accountable for my actions in that over-orgasmed state. I will plead temporary insanity and the judge will rule in my favor.”

Bert whined like a child before carefully lifting himself off and rolling over onto the mattress. “One of these days I’m gonna give you multiple orgasms and you’re gonna love it and then you’ll be begging me for them.”

Gerard just rolled his eyes, grabbing his discarded boxers to wipe himself off. “You know, when I have sex with Lynds, sometimes I can go like forty-five minutes before coming, but with you, I feel like I’m in fuckin’ high school again. It’s like ten minutes and that’s it.”

“I know, same,” Bert nodded, one arm resting behind his head on the pillow, “It’s just so different. With you, I feel like I’m...high, like I can’t control anything. Or at least the closest I’ve felt to high since being actually high.”

Gee looked over at Bert, eyes scanning his side-profile, wondering how their minds were somehow set to the same wavelength all the time. It had always been that way. He was startled when Bert spoke again, interrupting his daydream.

“You called me ‘babe.’”

“What?”

“A minute ago. You said ‘Get the fuck off me, babe,’ or whatever you said,” Bert turned his head to look at Gerard’s eyes, but Gee turned his quickly to the ceiling.

“That’s not what I said,” Gerard stated simply. That part was true. He knew for sure he hadn’t said ‘fuck.’ Had he said ‘babe?’ He couldn’t remember. If he had, it definitely hadn’t been on purpose. How could he not remember what he’d said not two minutes ago? His face was turning red and he could feel it, and he braced for the light mockery that Bert was about to make of him.

“Jesus, don’t freak out, Gee, it’s fine,” Bert replied, reaching an arm to rest across Gerard’s chest, “I liked it. It was fuckin’ cute. Like old times. Made me feel warm and fuckin’...fuzzy inside or some shit. Say it more. Or don’t, you know, I’d never try to tell you what to do.”

Gerard laughed, feeling the warmth in his cheeks recede but another, more dangerous feeling in him that was only growing.

Bert placed a soft kiss to Gee’s jawline and plucked the room service brochure off the nightstand. “So what do you say, babe, pizza for breakfast?”

—

The two of them spent the rest of the day vacillating between eating pizza, talking, and sex, and did not leave the room except to smoke, nor did they at any point even think to turn the tv on— they were entertainment enough for each other. They went to sleep late and woke up early, rubbing their eyes, drinking shitty hotel coffee as they put their suitcases back together, and giving each other sleepy kisses as they got ready to leave. They eventually made their way downstairs and out to the parking lot where the buses sat, band and crew waiting to stash their suitcases in the hold. The sun was just starting to rise past the horizon and a beam of sun eyed them from behind the parking lot. As they waited, the sound of suitcase wheels came up behind them.

It was Frank, large sunglasses covering half of his face and a cigarette already in hand. “You two have fun yesterday?” he deadpanned, looking straight ahead and taking a drag of his cigarette.

From somewhere nearby, Mikey piped up. “Fuck, Frank, good morning to you, too, can you at least wait until the sun comes up to stop minding your own business?”

“Kind of hard to mind your own business when you can hear the screaming on the other side of your wall for twenty-four hours while you’re nursing a hangover,” Frank sneered. He tossed his suitcase in the hold and took a last drag of his cigarette before tossing the butt on the pavement. “I’ll probably get more sleep on this bus, for christsake.” 

Gerard looked over at Bert with a knowing expression. They both knew who the loud one was.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi guys, sorry for the delay, I had a little bit of writer’s block but I actually planned out the rest of this story and there’s going to be eleven chapters, I think. Special thanks to throwupsparkles for helping me out. If you haven’t read her shit, honestly go do that rn before you even read this, especially Twisting Fate bc DAMN u will cry ur goddamn eyes out. Anyway here you go, chapter 7. It’s the first one with no smut, so if that’s what you’re looking for, I’m so sorry but it will be back next chapter and better than ever, trust me.

Over the next few dates, they both simply tried their best to stay out of Frank’s way. Toronto, Boston, New York, and Philly passed them by with no major issues. When they were driving to Atlanta, Frank muttered something about whether or not Bert had his own bus to be on, which Bert knew was fair but at this point, he and Gee were used to sleeping next to each other most nights and they weren’t about to change that anytime soon. They’d stayed on Bert’s bus once but Gerard complained that their hot water kettle didn’t get as hot as his and that his voice wasn’t going to be the same, which Bert had thought was maybe the most rockstar-diva-esque thing he’d ever heard Gee say, but he’d rolled his eyes and gone with it. Besides, Gerard had said to just ignore Frank and that “he’ll come around eventually, but he just has to be a fuckin’ brat first. This is always how he gets when he’s mad.” So that’s what Bert did, not that he had to put too much effort into it because Frank mostly spent time in his bunk with the curtain closed and spoke to no one, not even Mikey or Ray. Mikey had asked them if they knew what was up and they’d both just shrugged; they could infer at this point that Bert and Gerard were sleeping together, and Bert assumed that his own bandmates had come to their conclusions, as well, since he was never on his own bus, but no one had asked about it yet, which was nice. 

Bert didn’t even know how to explain their relationship at this point; he could just say they’re friends with benefits and brush it off with a “Come on man, it’s tour, it’s nothing,” but they were also attached to each other at the hip every second of the day that they didn’t have tour stuff to be doing, and he knew that fact hadn’t gotten past anyone, so he mostly just hoped all day that no one asked— he didn’t really have an answer for anyone. He wasn’t even sure if he had an answer for himself, to be honest. All he knew was that being near Gerard was like crack and he just couldn’t stop. The guy made him laugh harder and longer than he’d ever laughed before and he could literally tell him anything. Any anxiety Bert had could be quelled simply by being by Gee’s side; he felt a little guilty for taking up so much of the other’s time and he honestly couldn’t even remember if or when Gerard had even spoken to his wife in the past couple of days, but Gee hadn’t even talked about her and seemed to be an equally willing party in the seemingly lesbian-like Uhaul extravaganza in which they were participating. They had two days off in New Jersey that were coming up and Gerard had already mentioned that his mother was excited to see Bert again after all this time and was planning on making him something special for dinner, and it had made Bert laugh to think of Donna fussing around a casserole or something in their old, familiar kitchen just for him.

The day of the Newark show after sound check, the my chem boys couldn’t stop chattering about seeing their families and which of their old friends were coming to the show, and Bert watched Frank in the green room on his own in the corner, fiddling with his guitar quietly, the person who ought to be most excited to be in Jersey, to sleep on his own bed, see his family. Frank mumbled about going out for a cigarette but it was so quiet that Bert was probably the only one to catch it, and he followed a few feet behind, going out the back door of the venue after him. There were old, empty salt-melt buckets flipped upside down and repurposed as stools in the alley against the side of the building, which struck Bert as a very New Jersey aesthetic, and, much to Frank’s chagrin, they both sat down and lit cigarettes.

Frank didn’t acknowledge Bert for the first full minute that they smoked beside each other, and it was clear to Bert that it would continue like this unless he began the conversation. As much as Bert was annoyed with the little fucker, he sort of wanted to make sure he was okay, too. “You don’t seem as stoked as everyone else to be here. I sort of figured even with everything else, you would be. Are you okay?”

“Why are you asking me that?” Frank deadpanned, keeping his eyes on the brick wall ahead of them.

“We used to be friends,” Bert shrugged, dragging on his cigarette, “I mean, you yourself are the one who suggested we come on this tour with you guys, which I can only hope to mean you also thought of us as friends at one point.”

Frank mulled this over for what felt like a long time, smoking and fiddling with the ends of his hair. “I don’t really want to go home.”

“Why is that?” Bert asked, turning his eyes to Frank’s side profile.

Frank took a few moments to respond, finally making eye contact with Bert for the first time in days. “I mean, I’m excited to see my kids but it’s just been weird between Jamia and I lately.”

“Maybe seeing her in person will be a little better though? I know the long-distance thing makes things weird sometimes,” Bert suggested, knowing fully well this was not the problem but offering it up anyway because he wasn’t sure what else to say.

“I don’t know, man. I’m just not sure if it’s the same anymore,” Frank replied in a tone that made Bert a little sad and then continued a moment later, “Do you ever wonder if you made all the right choices? Like in your life?”

Bert raised his eyebrows and flicked his ash off to the side, nodding. “Yeah, dude. I think everyone does.”

Frank sighed, averting his eyes again to the wall. “I know. Sometimes I feel like I’m the only one, though.”

“Well...look Frank, I mean...you don’t have to feel so alone.”

“Yeah? And who am I supposed to talk to about it? Everyone’s happy as fuck except me. I don’t think anyone could even understand,” Frank snapped, whipping his head around to look at Bert again, which made Bert wince.

“Jesus, Frank, no offense and I know you hate this word but you sound like an emo fuckin teenager,” Bert chuckled, clamping his cigarette between his lips to push up the sleeves of his hoodie and continuing, his voice muffled by the cig. “I know you hate us but you can talk to me and Gerard. We probably relate more than you think we do,” he said, wondering again when Gee last spoke to Lynz.

Frank sighed. “I don’t hate you guys. I actually feel bad for being such a dick, so I’m...sorry,” he trained his eyes on Bert’s while he spoke and although Bert was a little surprised, he could tell the other man meant it. With the first full close-up view of Frank’s face he’d had in awhile, he realized that Frank honestly looked like he’d barely aged at all since fifteen years ago. “I was just hurt because I thought me and Gerard were on the same page, but it wasn’t really about you and it’s honestly not even really about Gee...well…that much. So yeah. Sorry.” 

“No big deal, man. I feel for you, I really, really do,” Bert replied, maintaining their eye contact and slowly nodding as a gesture of empathy, “You don’t have to hide from everyone all the time, you know. What are you even doing in your bunk all the time?”

“Not much,” Frank laughed, a forced, tired sound, taking another drag of his cigarette and studying the slowly dwindling nub, “Watching movies mostly. Sleeping. A lot.”

“Well,” Bert started, tossing his cigarette to the ground and standing to press it out with his shoe, “If you ever want to watch a movie with us instead, just let me know. Even if you don’t want to talk.”

Frank nodded, his lips forming a tight smile as he looked up from his ice-melt bucket. “Thank you, Bert, really.”

— 

A few days and three Donna Way casseroles later, Bert was punching in the door code to the bus, rubbing his eyes as the electric hiss of the hydraulics pulled the door apart and stepping inside. It was not even six in the morning and they had eighteen hours of driving ahead of them— granted, there was thankfully a hotel stay in between, for which Bert was deeply grateful. Donna had insisted for (read: all but forced) him to stay at their house with Gee and Mikey which would have been weird if she didn’t basically consider Bert her third son, even after all these years. However, she’d given him the guest room and neither Bert nor Gerard, nor especially Mikey, felt it appropriate to call attention to the fact that they sort of didn’t need separate rooms, so Bert had set an alarm each morning to leave Gee’s childhood bed (which was also weird in and of itself, but don’t get Bert started on that one), and go back to the guest bed. Each morning after he went back to his room, he found it difficult to sleep without Gee’s skin on his, and he’d just lay there for three hours until it became a normal time to get out of bed. Because of this, his sleep schedule was totally fucked and he’d probably clocked ten hours of sleep total between the three nights they’d been in Jersey. Donna had supplied them with coffee this morning and kissed their cheeks profusely on the way out the door, so Bert was temporarily sustained by the caffeine, but he knew he was going to crash soon. When he thought of the gentle rock of the moving bus and the darkness of the bunk, he could almost feel the sleep coming for him where he stood.

He kicked off his shoes and walked into Gerard already there on the bench, staring down into his blank phone. Bert cocked his head to the side, frowning and trying to assess the situation. “Hey. Are you...what’s wrong, Gee?” Bert asked, sitting down next to him and placing one hand on his knee and the other around his waist.

“Yeah, um…” Gee took a deep breath and let it out slowly before finally looking up at Bert, “I just talked to Lynds. I think we’re gonna…uh...I think we’re getting a divorce.”

Bert’s jaw fell open a bit and he sat up and twisted on the bench to face Gerard. “What? Why?”

“Well, I told her about us the other day and she was obviously fine with it but it’s just made me think these past few days with you at my parents’ house...I don’t know, we just kind of agreed that our marriage has basically just devolved into friendship and...coparenting, and I just think...I mean, we both think the spark is sort of gone. I brought it up first but it was a pretty civil conversation. I mean, we still love each other.”

Bert laughed. “Sorry, but I feel like I’m your child and you’re telling me that mommy and daddy are breaking up.” 

He’d meant to make Gee smile but his face dropped a little instead. “God, Bandit. We’re gonna have to tell Bandit.”

“Oh shit, Gee, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—“

“It’s fine, it’s really okay,” Gerard interrupted and placed his hand on top of Bert’s on his knee, “I don’t even think...I mean I think both of us saw this coming. I’m not even necessarily sad, really, just kind of...taking it in, I guess.”

Bert took a few seconds to absorb what he was being told, his eyes slipping from Gerard’s slowly to the carpet. “Did you do this because of me?”

“No. I mean...I don’t know, Bert! Sort of?” Gerard stammered, “You...confuse me! And seeing you with my parents and my brother, I just...I don’t know! I don’t know.”

Bert sighed, his heart pounding in his chest with no signs of slowing.

“We got married when we were so young and we’ve been together for a long time. She just wants me to be happy, that’s all. The rest doesn’t really matter,” Gerard added quietly. 

“Am I what makes you happy?” Bert asked; he wasn’t going to be afraid of asking him what he wanted to know anymore. He trained his eyes on the other’s jawline since Gee seemed to be so fascinated by his own thighs.

Gerard was quiet, and for a moment Bert thought he was going to give some bullshit nod again, but he wanted to hear it. He wanted to hear him say it, at least some semblance of commitment.

“Yeah. You are,” he said firmly as if reading Bert’s mind, and finally looked up at him, “I mean for better or for worse, you make me really happy. You’re...you’re it, Bert. I think you’ve always been it.”

Bert sidled closer to Gerard’s side and rested his head on the other’s shoulder. “I’m sorry about Lynds.”

“It’s okay. You don’t have to be sorry.”

“You make me happy, too.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” Bert responded, pressing a soft kiss to the base of Gerard’s neck just outside of the neck of his t-shirt, “Maybe I’ll talk to Alison and see if she’d be willing to have an open relationship or something.”

Gerard nodded and hummed in the affirmative but his eyes stared into the distance, wondering in the back of his mind if what he’d done was all for nothing.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi here is this, I hope you guys like it, I THINK U WILL THO. I hope it doesn’t bug you guys that I don’t post on a schedule literally at all, I just can’t force my creativity to flow like that, y’all know what I’m sayin? Oh here’s another thing, I realized like literally the other day that I never write condoms into fics and I just wanted to say that it’s probs bc I’m a fuckin lesbian and I forget that condoms even exist like 94% of the time but I support safe sex, okay thanks 4 coming to my ted talk, bye.
> 
> Thank u again to throwupsparkles for helping me get my shit together, read her shit pls
> 
> TW very light mentions of drug use, nothing too crazy

Over the next week, things on the bus got a little weird, to say the least and Bert felt like they were all sort of losing their minds. First of all, they drove from Jersey to Florida to Houston to Dallas and not only were the miles getting to them all, but the heat had increased steadily as the miles went on; Bert knew it was normal for autumn in Texas but it was still too hot for him, and Bert briefly considered why he lived in Australia and not Antarctica. Maybe it was just being on the road that made it feel hotter than when he was home, even when they cranked the air conditioning on the bus. 

Secondly, after Gerard had told him about him and Lynz, Bert had been anxious to answer calls from Alison, mostly only answering for Facetime calls if he knew his daughters were going to be there. Gerard had walked in on the tail end of his calls a few times, doing a poor job at hiding an expression of disappointment when they still ended with ‘Talk soon, I love you.’ Every time he was alone with Gee, he felt in the other’s gaze that he wanted to ask Bert if he’d talked to her, but luckily for Bert, he hadn’t asked, although avoiding the subject was causing just as much tension as discussing it, so it didn’t really matter.

Third, Frank was fucking off the rails and Bert and Gerard had taken to spending more time with him just to watch over him like he was a child that needed supervision because most of the time, he acted like one. He’d been drinking almost every day that week and at one point, he somehow picked up coke at one of their shows, which Bert only knew because Frank was darting around the bus and bouncing his leg up and down whenever he sat down. That day, he’d gone on and on to Bert and Gee through blown pupils about a book he’d been reading, although Bert wasn’t even sure when Frank had had the time to read. The more time Bert spent with Frank, the more Frank became sort of an enigma to him; he’d never known Frank to have alcoholic tendencies and, to be honest, he didn’t really think it was like that—it just sort of seemed like Frank was falling apart a little at the seams and trying to patch it up himself but failing miserably. Although, he was starting to understand why Frank and Gerard had once been a thing. Frank had mostly dropped the whole thing and had quit giving them a hard time but Bert could still see the way he looked at Gerard, especially in the mornings before Frank had the wits about him to hide it when he saw Gee climbing out of his bunk shirtless. If Bert tried to be objective about it, it was sort of endearing, especially since Frank and Gerard had started to settle back into their friendship, but it still annoyed Bert a little, tiny bit. Okay, a lot. Okay, so he wished Frank would stay in his damn lane and just jerkoff silently at night like everyone else with unrequited love, but it still wasn’t going to stop Bert from making sure he was ultimately okay and that he didn’t start shooting up or something when they weren’t looking.

Besides, despite everything else, Frank was pretty cool in his few lucid moments between sobriety and trainwreck mode, Bert thought as he talked to the other man outside a hotel somewhere between Dallas and Denver. This happened to be one of those moments, as Frank was only two beers in since Bert and Gee had miraculously convinced him to lay off the hard liquor for awhile, and Bert thought maybe Frank had finished his coke off at least, since he hadn’t seen any signs of it in a few days. Frank was currently babbling about something Ray had done last week. 

“And then he fucking tipped over,” Frank was laughing so hard that his beer was splashing over the edges of his solo cup and he was gasping out the words like his life depended on it, Gerard sitting next to him on the bench doubled over between his knees and laughing in that totally silent way that only happens when you’ve been laughing too hard for too long, “and he spilled the whole fucking thing, and the Cheerios were fucking _everywhere_.”

He paused to fall into the silent laughing, as well, punching Gerard in the thigh in a gesture that meant “I need you to stop laughing so I can also stop or else we’re never going to stop.”

“And,” Frank continued, sitting up and taking a deep, shaky breath in an attempt to keep his likely aching diaphragm at bay, but another giggle escaping only a few moments later, “Even though he cleaned it up, I kept finding fuckin’ soggy Cheerios everywhere for days. When I woke up this morning, there was one in my bunk.”

Gerard cracked up again, slinking his body down into the bench and tipping his head over the back of it, his laughter coming out in an odd, guttural tone because of the angle, like he’d rather die than have to keep laughing. Bert just watched them from his stance a few feet from the bench, shaking his head and dragging from his cigarette. He suspected that this story was potentially an offshoot of an inside joke because he didn’t find it particularly as funny as the other two seemed to find it, but he was amused to watch the dynamic between the two of them. Frank tipped his head to the side and rested it on the back of the bench, letting out a deep sigh once his laughter had faded off and dropping his gaze to stare at Gerard’s neck. Bert pressed his lips together tightly and simmered for a moment, but when his eyes landed on Frank’s neck, following the lines of his tattoos there, something else sidled up alongside his anger that he couldn’t quite put his finger on, and when he finally figured out what it was, he honestly wasn’t sure if he could even hold it back once it settled itself into his mind. 

“Wow,” Bert suddenly interjected, which ripped Frank out of his dreamy state, drawing out the word for exaggeration, “You really can’t help yourself, can you, Frank?”

Frank furrowed his brows in confusion and Gerard cocked his head at him, which he took to mean “Don’t even start, Bert,” but he ignored it and sauntered over behind the bench, resting his hands on the wood at either side of their heads and turning to Frank who looked up at him like he was afraid he was going to get hit.

“You’ve been staring at him all week, Frank, why don’t you just kiss him?” Bert asked with a shrug, keeping his voice light and conversational, as if he were asking what time they were leaving tomorrow morning, and taking one last pull on his cigarette before tossing the butt to the ground.

“What?” Frank breathed, releasing a forced laugh and turning to keep his eyes straight ahead. Gee looked up at him and Bert could see the gears turning in his head, trying to figure out what Bert was up to. He’d get it eventually. They were on the same wavelength. 

“You heard me,” Bert replied, leaning down toward the shell of Frank’s ear, being sure to speak loud enough that Gerard could still hear, “You should kiss him.” 

They both remained silent but Gee snapped his head up at Bert like he finally figured it out, his confused expression turning into a smug one and his mouth curling up at one corner.

“Don’t you want to remember what he tastes like again, Frankie? Remember how his body moves when he gets turned on?” Bert whispered, risking a nibble at Frank’s earlobe. Frank let out a soft sigh and shifted a little on the bench, glancing over at Gerard’s weird little smile and then back up to Bert.

Bert lifted his hand from the bench and cupped the back of Frank’s neck, his fingers sliding up into the other’s hair. “Don’t you want to remember what he sounds like when he comes, Frankie?”

Frank shuddered and leaned into Bert’s whispers, and Bert watched Gerard’s eyes flutter to the growing bulge in Frank’s jeans.

“I wanna see you kiss him, Frankie,” Bert mumbled, pressing a single kiss under Frank’s ear.

Frank suddenly lurched forward out of Bert’s grasp and his mouth and Gee’s found each other in a tangle of teeth and tongues. Bert watched with slightly parted lips, sliding his hand onto Frank’s shoulder and down over his chest, his other hand reaching down around Gerard and gently lifting up his t-shirt. “Touch him, Frank.”

Frank did as he was told and slipped his hand up the front of Gee’s shirt, resulting in a quiet moan from Gee that was lost in Frank’s mouth.

Bert leaned back up and pressed a soft kiss to each of their cheeks. “Upstairs?” he murmured, and both of them jumped up from the bench, clamoring into the hotel doors like they’d suddenly forgotten how to walk. Bert followed behind them with a smirk. He wasn’t sure if this was going to end well or not but he was living in the goddamn moment, alright? Besides, this was already a better scenario than the last time the three of them entered a hotel together, so he was going to count it as a small win. 

In the elevator, Gerard cupped the back of Bert’s neck and pressed his lips briefly to the other’s before pulling away and glancing to Frank and back to Bert. Bert reached out and bunched his fist in Frank’s t-shirt, pulling the shorter man into his chest and capturing Frank’s lower lip gently between his teeth. When he let go, Frank pressed his lips back into Bert’s, their tongues hesitantly exploring one another and their hips grinding together. Kissing Frank after being so used to Gee’s kisses these past few weeks was strange; Frank’s kiss was rough, demanding, and Bert wasn’t sure if it was a product of their current situation or if it was just Frank. He didn’t hate it—at all, and by no means—it was just different. Gerard placed a hand on each of their backs and nuzzled his nose between the others to pull them apart, leaning in to kiss Bert again and palming at Frank’s bulge.

At the room door, Gerard fumbled with the key and when he finally got it, Frank didn’t let a second pass by between the approving beep of the lock and the door closing behind them before shoving Gee into the wall and attacking his mouth again. Bert wrapped his arms around Frank’s waist and worked at the button of his jeans, kissing down the back of his neck and sucking hard at the inked skin where it met his shoulder. When he got Frank’s zipper down, he unfastened Gerard’s, too, pressing his hips into Frank’s ass and inducing a low groan from the man between them. Bert kissed a line up to Frank’s ear and simply let his breath hit the other man’s neck for a moment before whispering, “Take off your clothes so Gee can see you, Frankie.”

Frank stepped back to furiously yank off his clothes and Bert kicked his shoes off and pulled Gerard’s shirt over his head, looking into his eyes for a few moments to search for any signs of protest to having Frank there, but he only found rapacious lust and he broke his gaze to kiss lovingly down Gee’s jawline. Bert’s fingertips explored the lines of Gerard’s hips and slipped down past the waistband of the older man’s boxers. He felt Gee’s breath on his neck and heard his sharp inhale when Bert wrapped his fingers around his cock, running his thumb over the head.

“You ready to put on a show for Frankie?” Bert mumbled, stroking Gerard’s cock slowly and watching his eyelashes flutter.

“F-fuck, Bert, yes,” Gerard moaned, bucking his hips against Bert’s hand, “Can’t believe we’re doing this.”

Bert smirked up at him and then Frank was by his side again, naked and tipping Bert’s chin toward himself with his index finger, taking the other’s lips with his own. Frank’s hands travelled up Bert’s sides and then back down to the hem of his t-shirt to pull it up over his head, making Gerard whimper when Bert had to let go of his cock. Bert let Gee suffer for a moment so he could get his hands on Frank, his eyes falling slowly over his tattooed torso in the rare moments that their kiss broke. He knew Frank had a lot of tattoos but he’d never really tried to imagine it, and he couldn’t help but stare. He slid a hand down to Frank’s inner thigh and gave it a rough squeeze, his fingernails surely leaving marks in the other’s skin, which made Frank buck his hips eagerly into the denim against Bert’s leg. He teased his fingers at Frank’s hipbones and then pushed the other’s chest gently away from him, reveling in the look of desperation on his face when Bert stopped touching him. When he looked back at Gerard, the man against the wall wore a similar expression and Bert had to keep himself from laughing, so pleased with himself already; he had these two wrapped around his finger and he’d barely touched them, the idea of it all beginning to make his own shorts feel tight at the groin. 

He kept a hand on Frank’s chest as he turned to Gerard and ran a finger from his collarbone to the line where his pubic hair began, slowly and as light as he could, tipping his head to the side to maintain an innocent demeanor that he knew would drive the others crazy. “What do you want Frankie to do to you, Gee?”

Gerard inhaled sharply when Frank reached out to place a hand on his hip, extending his thumb to press lightly at the crease of his leg. “On your knees,” he managed to say, his voice hoarse and gritty, and his confidence in barking out the order sent a current down Bert’s spine that went straight to his hard-on. He slid his hand from Frank’s chest as the shorter man dropped to his knees immediately, working to pull Gee’s jeans and boxers down mid-thigh while Bert unfastened his own shorts and stepped out of them as they fell to the floor. Bert slipped a hand behind Gerard and squeezed his ass, grinding his cock against the other’s thigh and sucking roughly at Gee’s neck.

Frank wrapped a hand around Gerard’s cock and looked up at them through his eyelashes, running his tongue quickly over the head. “Fuck, you guys are so fucking hot,” he remarked breathily before plunging his mouth down onto Gee’s length. Gerard released a frenzied moan into Bert’s hair and slid his fingers into Frank’s below him. As Frank picked up his pace, Bert suddenly felt Gerard’s hand on his cock and groaned against the other’s shoulder, rolling his hips into Gee’s touch. Bert’s head was swimming and he felt lightheaded as he leaned up to capture Gerard’s lips in his, pressing his tongue against the other’s and he swore to god his heart was going to beat straight out of his chest.

Bert pulled back from Gee just enough that he could still feel the other’s lips against his as he spoke. “You want Frankie to fuck you, babe?” he mumbled, and in turn he heard Frank release a muffled moan around Gerard’s cock, which made Gee tip his head back against the wall and flutter his eyelids. Bert wet his first two fingers and reached back behind him, pressing them to Gerard’s hole and sliding them both in slowly, a throaty moan falling from Gee’s lips. Bert pushed his fingers in and out, leaning down again to nip at Gerard’s neck, letting out a moan as he felt the other’s thumb over the head of his cock. 

“Tell Frankie what you want, Gee,” Bert hummed against his jugular, moving his hips toward Gerard’s hand when his strokes began to falter due to his many distractions. Bert saw the man below them fidgeting on his knees out of the corner of his eye and thought of Frank’s untouched cock, hard between his legs. “Look how patient he’s being, Gee. He’s not even touching himself, he’s waiting for you,” Bert added, angling his fingers up to press against the spot that he knew would make Gerard groan. Gee bucked his hips into Frank’s mouth and Frank choked a little but quickly regained his rhythm. 

“Jesus, sorry Frank, you’re so fucking...fuck,” Gerard started, interrupting himself with a sharp breath when Frank slowed down to look up at him through his eyelashes, “Fuck me, Frankie. I need it, please.”

Bert tugged gently on Frank’s arm to pull him up, and when Gerard let out a quiet whimper at the sudden loss of contact, Bert pressed his fingers again into that spot and listened to him cry out while he pulled Frank in for a kiss, tasting Gerard on his tongue. He pulled his fingers slowly out of Gee and herded them toward the bed, attaching his mouth to Gerard’s once more and tripping over shoes and suitcases as they stumbled across the room. Bert fell backwards when the back of his knees hit the mattress and he slid back until he hit the headboard, watching Gerard kick his shoes off and step out of his jeans and boxers. Frank knelt on the bed beside him and kissed down Bert’s chest, making him inhale sharply when he felt Frank’s hand on his cock. He closed his eyes and tipped his head back against the headboard and not three seconds later, felt the head of his dick being enveloped in warmth, opening his eyes to Gerard’s looking up at him on all fours from between his legs.

“He’s ready, Frankie, I opened him up just for you,” Bert drawled into the shell of Frank’s ear before pulling him into a kiss and biting at his lip; he could tell that Frank’s desperation was running high now, given the sounds he was making into Bert’s mouth and his sensitivity even just to Bert’s hand on his hip. He pulled away and pushed Frank’s shoulder gently toward the foot of the bed. Frank positioned himself behind Gerard and, a moment later, Gee hummed around Bert’s cock and began pressing backward into Frank’s hips with each thrust. 

“Fuck, Gee,” Frank cried, reaching to grab Gerard’s cock.

Bert laced a hand through Gee’s hair and watched the other on his cock with parted lips, watched Frank losing his sanity. Gerard’s movements were a little ragged with Frank behind him but regardless, Bert felt a surge move through him every time Frank thrusted and he could feel himself getting closer.

Gerard kept making incredible noises around Bert’s cock and they sent vibrations through his very core and he wanted to keep his eyes open but his vision was a total blur, and finally he cried out Gerard’s name and came into his mouth, seeing nothing but stars.

When he came to, a never-ending string of noises was escaping from Frank’s mouth and Gerard’s eyelids were fluttering. Frank gave a few hard, shaky thrusts before crying out curse words, Gerard coming against the mattress around the same time. Bert watched from his dazed position at the headboard, pulling Gee up onto his chest by his shaky limbs. Frank collapsed beside them and yawned, contorting himself until he was under the covers.

“Sorry I was an asshole about your noise,” Frank mumbled into the pillow, floating his words together as he spoke, “I get it now.”

—

Frank awoke hours later to the room still dark and he wondered for a moment if the night he was almost certain he’d actually experienced had been a dream. The hypothesis was debunked about four seconds later when Bert rolled over in his sleep and elbowed him in the ribs. Frank winced and sat up, crawling out of bed toward the bathroom. As he took a wiz, he reviewed the facts—one, they’d had a threesome, two, he’d fucked Gerard, and three, Bert was actually...pretty fucking hot? He felt confused about that last one, so he was just going to leave it be, and the other two he would potentially consider in the morning. His brain was foggy from sleep and orgasms and he couldn’t think at all.

When he came back, the lights from the parking lot glowed through the window and cast a beam of light over Bert and Gerard, who were sleeping in spooning position. Bert had his arm around Gee, who was clutching the other’s hand up against his chest and his head turned up slightly so that Bert’s nose grazed his cheek.

After about one second of deliberation, Frank got into the spare bed because of course he was being naive in this stupid afterglow; they loved each other. Whether or not either of them knew that was beyond him but it was pretty fucking clear to Frank. As he settled into the covers of the colder second bed, he sighed and stared at the two of them until his eyelids felt heavy again, giving into how adoring they were of each other and wishing that he could have that, and just before he drifted off to sleep, Jamia flashed into his head and he realized that he did.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey y’all, this chapter’s kind of short but it gets the point across, plus I’m on a roll so I’m probably gonna update again within the next couple of days. I preemptively apologize 4 what ur about to read, enjoy<3

The last night of tour crept up on them more quickly than anyone expected. The Vegas show had been wild and everyone had put in their all; Gerard didn’t think he’d seen Ray play that hard in a long time and Frank had spent most of the show on the floor which was always a good sign. They were bummed that the tour was over but it also meant they were going to start writing new music which was just as exciting. They’d planned to kick some things around during tour but Gerard had been...distracted, so he hadn’t done much writing and he had a lot of work to do to catch up to the others, although he didn’t really think Frank had written much either, which made him feel better. After the threesome, Frank had more or less gone back to normal and Gerard wasn’t really sure what kind of miracle that was; he’d worried at the time that it would further impact Frank’s feelings for him, but it seemed to be exactly the opposite. Frank wasn’t being weird around him anymore, which was actually nice, and he and Bert had been hanging out with him again for the last couple of days, although this time it was less to make sure Frank didn’t kill himself and more because they just got along. The three of them hadn’t even had a serious conversation about the whole thing but they weren’t really those kinds of people, and besides, each of them was still able to throw in a joke about it here and there, which made Gerard feel like it was all good.

Bert still hadn’t mentioned anything about Alison but Gerard was just trying to forget about it and enjoy the last couple of hours they had together, because he wasn’t sure what was going to happen after. He was trying not to think about it, but Bert had been acting weird the past few days, hadn’t been as talkative as he usually was, and that scared him. So trying not to think about it was the only thing he really had. 

He was, in fact, currently trying not to think about it as he sat outside the venue with Bert and Frank, chainsmoking and talking about tomorrow. Gerard didn’t even want to think about tomorrow.

“Fuck, I’m gonna have to quit smoking again,” Frank laughed as he lit another cigarette, “I shouldn’t have even started back up in the first place.”

Gerard started to voice his agreement but then remembered that he wasn’t even going home to a marriage so it didn’t really matter so much whether he was smoking or not. Besides, he knew Lynz wouldn’t care anyway and the worst he would get is lightly made fun of. She loved him, that’s what made this so hard.

“Get a juul,” Bert replied with a shrug, clamping his cigarette between his lips to zip up his hoodie.

“Don’t those things kill people?” Frank quipped. 

“Less people than cigarettes, probably.”

Frank chuckled, looking down at the red end of his cigarette. “Oh well. I can’t fucking wait to sleep in my own bed. And see my dog, holy shit.”

“Are you um…” Gerard cleared his throat, “Are you and Jamia good?”

“Oh, yeah, we’re fine. I talked to her the other day and sort of just...spilled everything. We have to talk more when I get home but I think we’re gonna be okay,” Frank nodded to himself and looked up at Bert, “I think I was taking her for granted, you know?”

Gerard saw Bert’s eyes fall to his lap and the other man hummed in response.

Frank grabbed his beer bottle from the ground and tipped the last of it into his mouth. “I think I’m gonna go grab another one. You guys want anything?”

They both shook their heads before Frank stood and headed off in the direction of the bus, Gerard looking up at Bert as soon as Frank had turned around. “So,” Gerard said simply, reaching over to Bert’s lap with his free hand and lacing his fingers through his.

“So?”

“Did you talk to her?”

Bert recoiled from the question and looked away to take a drag from his cigarette, his fingers going limp in Gerard’s hand. “Yeah, I did. A few days ago.”

Gerard’s face fell and he straightened his posture, slowly pulling his hand away from Bert’s. “A few days ago? And you haven’t told me until now, which means—“

“She was pissed, Gee. She lost it. She told me I could fuck whoever but when she found out it was you, she...she said it wasn’t fair because you’re my ex and that’s different, which I get, I mean I’ve talked about you before,” Bert sighed, refusing to look at Gerard, “I didn’t even get far enough to ask her about an open relationship, I mean she was livid, just the fact that it’s you. I managed to talk her down, but I’m probably in a load of shit when I get home.”

“A load of shit,” Gerard repeated slowly, staring at the side of Bert’s head, “So you’re going home.”

“Of course I’m going home, Gee. I...fuck, man, I just...I have to try to fix this. I can’t just...I have a family. I’m sorry, I am, but it doesn’t take away from the time we’ve spent together at all.”

“Bert, are you kidding me? Don’t feed me some party line that I know you’ve been thinking up for days, to what? Let me down easy? Of course it fucking takes away from the time we’ve spent together, I mean what was all of this, then? I thought this was actually going somewhere.”

“I thought so, too, but...I mean what do you want me to do here? I don’t really have a choice, Gee.”

“Don’t call me that!” Gerard snapped, tossing his cigarette to the ground and folding his arms across his chest, “So what, I’ve just set in motion a divorce with my wife of thirteen years for nothing?”

“I never told you to do that. Do not put that on me,” Bert replied quietly, despite Gerard’s increasing volume.

“It’s not about what you told me, it’s about how you made me _feel_ , Bert! You’re all I ever think about, all I want, and because of you, I’m going home to talk to my soon-to-be-ex wife about a custody arrangement for our daughter because I decided I wanted a divorce, and all for what, now? To be alone? Again? And you’re just gonna leave?” Gerard stood up and took a few steps away from Bert, not being able to bear the body heat from the contact of his arm.

“You left me first!” Bert yelled, his voice cracking, and when Gee turned back to look at him again, Bert was _crying_ , real, fat tears, and his heart stopped because he realized that the thing he’d dreaded for days was actually happening and there was no way out of it. “This all could have been prevented if you’d just stayed by my side when you should have, Gerard! When I needed you!”

Gee sighed, his eyes falling to the pavement. “That’s not fair, we already talked about this. It was the best we could do at the time.”

Bert scoffed, wiping tears from his chin with his hoodie sleeve. “Well I’m not so sure we did our best anymore because I’m fucking in love with you but somewhere across the entire fucking ocean, I have a house where there’s a woman I love who _trusts_ and _loves_ me and two _little_ girls who have never even heard the word ‘divorce.’” He stopped and let out a sob that tore Gerard apart, the same feeling he’d had fifteen years ago upon hearing the same crack in Bert’s voice, only now it was weighed down by years of longing and regret. He tried to hold back his own tears but they rolled down his cheeks anyway, bitter and angry. 

“And what am I supposed to do with that, Gerard? How am I supposed to reconcile the memories of your mom making me pancakes and Alison playing with our daughters in my backyard? How am I supposed to choose between how your—“ another sob, “how your fucking skin feels, and...and tucking my daughters in at night. This is...it’s impossible, it’s fucking impossible.”

Gerard rolled his eyes which loosened more tears from the confines of his eyelids, but he didn’t really care at this point. “Don’t you think I thought of those things, too?” he yelled, spreading his arms incredulously, “I’ve been thinking about those things since night one, Bert! I’ve been thinking about them for two fucking weeks since I talked to Lynds! But you know what? I fucking chose you and I chose _your_ things! And I can’t fucking believe I’m your second choice once again.” His voice cracked and he had to stop and squeeze his eyes shut because he felt like he was going to pass out, and he wanted to sit down but he couldn’t bear to sit next to Bert, to be that close to him.

Bert leaned down and rested his elbows on his knees, holding his head in his hands, his breath rough and his voice coming through in sobs. “You don’t want me, Gee. I’m not good enough for you, I never was. Your life got so much better after you left and got sober, and now that I’m back in it, I’m making you miserable again. I love you too much to keep putting you through this.”

Gerard stared at Bert through blurry eyes, the other man becoming nothing but a blob in his vision and suddenly he felt like the world was disassembling itself around him, like the ground would drop out from under him any second now. He tried to remember to breathe but his chest felt like it was turning to stone and then he realized at once that the weight of his whole body felt like far too great of a burden for only his two feet.

The last thing he remembered before it went black were Bert’s sobs echoing off the alleyway bricks.

—

Frank entered the back lounge with a cup of tea, adjusting his pajama pants as he sat down on the end of the U-shaped couch. He rested his arm on the back of it as he gazed at the passed-out man a few feet away from him, sipping his tea. Luckily, he’d made it to Gerard’s side just as the other man had passed out, and the only casualty had been his full beer which was promptly shattered when he dropped it to catch him. Frank considered it a sign, anyway— he knew he’d been drinking way too much on this tour, so he’d switched for tea as soon as they’d gotten back to the bus. Plus, they were leaving soon, driving through the night to get back to LA; they would get there early in the morning and then he had a flight to catch back to New Jersey, so he really didn’t want to be hungover the next day, anyway.

In any case, he was glad he’d gotten back in time to catch Gee— it could have been a lot worse. Back in his drinking days, Gerard would sometimes pass out and get concussions from hitting his head, and it would freak Frank the fuck out. This time, he knew Gee would be fine, but he just wanted to make sure he was okay when he woke up. He could tell when he’d been walking back to their spot with his beer that something was going on between Gerard and Bert, although he hadn’t caught anything, just knew they’d both looked a mess. Frank figured if that had been him, he would want someone to talk to when he came to, and if Gerard didn’t, that would be fine, too.

Frank spent a few more minutes in his thoughts before there was finally some stirring from the other side of the couch. When Frank looked up, Gee rubbed his eyes before lolling his head to the side to look up at his friend across the way. “Fuck, I passed out, didn’t I?” Gerard asked, his voice rough with sleep, “Did you carry me here? Can’t believe our sweet baby angel is that strong.”

Frank scoffed. “Hey, I can lift...a fair amount. Anyway, Ray _might_ have helped me.”

Gerard barely smiled, if Frank could even call it that. “How long was I out?”

“Not long. An hour maybe,” Frank replied, bringing a knee up to his chest and sipping his tea. Gerard simply groaned in response. “What even happened, man?”

“I think I had a panic attack,” Gerard deadpanned, rolling onto his side and staring off into the room.

“I mean, I figured, but I meant before that. What happened with you and Bert?”

Gerard ignored his question, seemingly hearing only one word from it. “Where is he?”

“He’s um...well I don’t know, but I think he went back to his bus. He’s not here, anyway.” Frank bit the inside of his cheek, putting his tea down on the table and sliding over to Gee. Gerard lifted his head up while Frank got settled and then rested it down on the other’s lap.

They sat like that for a long time in silence, Frank stroking Gerard’s hair, and eventually they felt the bus start to move. Frank felt moisture through the leg of his pajama pants and pressed his lips together in empathy when he heard a barely audible whimper fall from Gee’s lips. 

“He’s gone,” Gerard whispered, his voice ragged and broken.

Frank didn’t know what to say, so he just continued stroking Gerard’s hair for awhile, listening to his old friend cry himself to sleep.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another that’s sort of short but look it’s a miracle I’m even finishing this as I usually get so bored writing longer fics, so count ur blessings, alright? Like I said in the last one, I’m on a roll so I’ll probs post the ending within a few days. As always, many thanks to throwupsparkles for helping with the plot. This one’s pretty fuckin sad too but I promise the next chapter won’t be as much of a bummer.

Gerard moved through the next four hours in a haze, going in and out of sleep. Frank had fallen asleep early on, his head tilted against the back of the couch in a way that looked uncomfortable, but Gee had been grateful that he’d stayed. He didn’t really want to talk but he didn’t want to be alone, either. Mostly, he’d just laid there listening to the sounds of the moving bus, replaying his conversation with Bert over and over again in his head. He wished he hadn’t passed out in the hopes that he might have been able to salvage their relationship, but he knew there was nothing else he could have said, knew that Bert had made up his mind. Gerard was so angry, but he felt like his body was made of sand, and every movement or exertion of energy felt like the hardest thing he’d ever done.

He barely even registered when the bus came to a stop in the dark park n’ ride, and even though he knew that the others were packing up their stuff and clearing out the bus, he just couldn’t get up. At one point, he felt the tears coming down again and just let them go until he heard the lounge door being opened. He wiped his cheeks lazily on his jacket and ignored the expression of pity on Mikey’s face as his brother handed him a cup of coffee. Gerard hesitated a moment before pulling himself up to a sitting position, gulping down the coffee so he didn’t have to keep holding onto it; he knew it was probably burning his mouth but he couldn’t really feel it.

Next thing he knew, someone was pulling him up and pressing the handle of a suitcase into his fingers, and then he was in Mikey’s car. Frank was sitting in the back seat with him, staring at him like he might shatter at any moment, and as they sped down through LA in the dull, early morning light, Gerard realized that it was because they were going to the airport to drop Frank off, which made his chest ache. He squeezed Frank’s hand all the way to the terminal and when they got there, Frank leaned over to hug him for a long time.

“Call me soon, Gee,” Frank mumbled into Gerard’s shoulder, rubbing his back gently before getting out of the car.

Gerard brought his knees up to his chest and slept until Mikey pulled up to Gee’s house. His brother got out of the car and pulled his suitcase from the trunk, setting it on the ground and turning to Gerard.

“Do you want me to stay? I will if you want,” Mikey asked as he closed the trunk.

Gerard’s mouth curled up ever so slightly at the corners and he wrapped his arms around his brother and sighed into the other’s shoulder. He knew Mikey wasn’t just asking to be nice and that he really would stay if Gee wanted, no questions asked, and that made him feel loved, if only for a moment. “Nah, man,” he began, realizing that he hadn’t spoken since last night and clearing his throat a bit, “Go home. Tell all your girls I said hi.”

“You sure, Gee?”

“Mhm,” he nodded and squeezed Mikey once more before grabbing his suitcase, “Talk to you soon, little brother.”

Mikey put a hand up to say goodbye and got back in his car, and Gerard watched as he drove off. He looked up at his house and wondered briefly what Bert’s house in Sydney looked like, imagining the other man sitting on the plane right about now. Gerard let out a deep sigh and headed inside, glancing at the sunrise behind the house and trying to take some strength from it before he entered the front door.

“Gee?” he heard Lynz shout from somewhere in the house.

“Hey,” he called out, setting his suitcase down by the door and kicking his shoes off. He followed her voice into the kitchen and saw that she was fully dressed, rushing around the room with a to-go coffee mug in her hand. When she saw him, she gave him a sad smile and came over to give him a hug, Gerard melting into her arms and exhaling against her shoulder. “I’m sorry, Lynds,” he voiced, the sound muffled by her jacket. He felt like he was going to fucking cry again but he swallowed and resolved to hold it back. He couldn’t tell her about Bert—it didn’t feel right, and he knew if he cried, she would pull it out of him somehow.

“It’s okay. I’m sorry, too. I wish it were different. I still love you, Gee. You’ll always have me, you know.”

Gerard nodded into her neck and made himself pull away from the hug before he broke down. “You just missed Bandit, she left for school, but I figured I’d bring her over here later, thought you’d want to see her,” Lynz informed him, going back to rushing around the kitchen.

“Yeah, I’d like that,” he nodded, sitting down at the kitchen island.

Lynz stopped and rested her hands on the other side of the island, looking down at the countertop for a few seconds before looking at Gerard again. “I’m going to stay with my parents for a little while until I get a place. I just think it’ll be easier for both of us that way. I thought maybe until then we could just switch off with Bandit every couple of days until we figure out something more permanent.”

Gerard nodded, biting at the inside of his cheek. He knew this had been coming. “I mean, I can find somewhere to stay if you want. Or I can just stay in the guest room or something. I don’t want you to feel like you have to leave.”

“No, absolutely not,” she replied with a soft smile, “You’ve already been gone for awhile, I think you deserve the bed. Plus, I’ve already talked to my mom and everything, so it’s already set. I really think it’ll be better for us this way.”

“Okay,” Gerard responded meekly.

“I gotta go but I’ll bring Bandit over when she gets out of school,” Lynz reiterated, coming around the island and pressing a kiss to his cheek before heading out the door, the resulting silence of the house seeping into his brain like a gas.

He sat at the island for awhile, staring across at the cabinets and willing the pressure behind his eyes to go away. Eventually, he stood up and ambled back to the foyer where he’d left his suitcase, dragging it up the stairs and down the hall to the bedroom where he folded it open on the floor. Gee began pulling out clothes and tossing them in a laundry basket, but paused when he noticed the sleeve of a white t-shirt that he didn’t recognize right away. He pulled it out and held it up, his breath hitching in his throat when he realized that it was one of Bert’s Corpus shirts. Leaning back against the side of his bed, he brought the material up to his face and inhaled Bert’s scent before closing his eyes and balling it up against his chest. The anger he’d felt over the past twelve hours was slowly giving way to hurt and helplessness and Gerard wasn’t really sure what to do with that. 

He wondered briefly if Bert was feeling the same way but then decided he didn’t care— Bert was the one who had done this to them, in fact, he _hoped_ that Bert felt even a fraction of what Gerard was feeling. Gee whimpered and felt his energy start to dissipate again, so he pulled himself up to the mattress and curled up on top of the blankets, clutching Bert’s t-shirt to his chin and letting the tears come again.

—

Gerard slept all afternoon until Lynz came back to drop Bandit off and his wave of depression was temporarily disrupted by his daughter’s sweet face. He spent the whole evening with Bandit and made her favorite foods, watched her favorite tv shows, helped her with her homework. Being away for tour had been the longest he’d been away from her in years and he couldn’t believe how much she’d grown in the past two months. Throughout the night, he thought about what Bert had said about his own daughters, empathizing more with him now that Bandit was right in front of him than he had when they’d fought. The thought was especially present in his mind as he was getting her ready for bed, making sure her school stuff was put together for the next day and tucking her in. He couldn’t help thinking about Bert getting home right about now, just in time to have dinner with his girls, and the thought made his lips turn up at the corners and his chest hurt at the same time.

When he went back to his room, he stared at Bert’s t-shirt on his bed and thought about texting him but reconsidered when he realized he didn’t know what he would even say. Besides, it didn’t really matter; Bert had made his choice.

—

The next day, Gerard dragged himself out of bed at six in the morning to get Bandit ready for school and make her breakfast, even waited at the bus stop with her, which was the highlight of his day and the sun had just barely risen. After the high of watching his daughter eat cereal and chat excitedly to her friends as the bus drove away, he couldn’t imagine that the rest of his day was going to beat it, and he was certainly correct about that. He found himself lying on the couch in his silent house, curled up under a blanket for hours and oscillating between staring at Bert’s folded up t-shirt on his coffee table and sleeping. He’d tried to watch tv but he couldn’t really focus on anything and every show just sounded like noise and gave him a headache. At some point, his tear ducts decided to open up again and he sobbed and screamed as loud as he could and listened to it echoing around his living room. He felt overwhelmed and wished he didn’t have to be in his own body for even just a minute, not necessarily that he were dead, just not there, just a little break from this. Eventually he calmed himself down and sat up from the couch, staring again at Bert’s t-shirt before grabbing it and throwing it across the room. It was extremely unsatisfying and he wished he were the kind of person that could just break shit in his house and not care.

He stood up and slowly padded into the kitchen, grabbing a glass and filling it up at the sink. Leaning against the island and sipping the water, he peered around the kitchen until his eyes landed on some liquor bottles on top of the fridge. Lynz didn’t drink very much so their presence was interesting but not shocking; she’d probably had friends over at some point while he’d been gone. He noted that there wasn’t much missing from each bottle and moved closer to study the labels— gin and vermouth. The gin looked like an expensive brand, one he’d never heard of, and he set his glass down and pulled the bottle carefully from the top of the fridge, reading the back of the label.

Gerard stood with the bottle in his hand, staring down at it, his eyes unfocused. Without even thinking, he unscrewed the cap and brought the neck of the bottle to his nose, the smell sending a high through every brain cell and nerve ending in his body. He leaned back against the side of the island and slid down to the floor, pulling his knees to his chest and bringing his nose to the bottle once more. Gerard contemplated the consequences of drinking this gin; would it really even be that bad? People drink all the time, he thought, maybe he could handle himself now. And he could take a break from himself for just a little while. It would be fine, and it wouldn’t be as dramatic as his last relapse, he convinced himself, hands shaking now as he took another whiff from the bottle.

At that moment, his phone went off in his pocket, interrupting the hours of maddening silence he’d experienced, and he jumped, knocking the bottle to the floor and releasing a shaky breath as the liquid glugged out across the floor. He pulled his phone from his jeans and his breath hitched when he saw the caller ID, letting out an uncontrollable sob before answering, trying and failing to get it together. “Mikey,” he managed to cry out before another sob escaped from his throat. He tried to speak, but he couldn’t get anything out; he could hear his brother on the other end of the line asking him questions but he didn’t register any of them, couldn’t understand, just clung to the sound of the other’s voice like a lifeline as his body was wracked with sobs and shakes.

Mikey remained on the phone with him for a long time, saying consoling words and walking him through breathing exercises, and when Gerard started to feel like he was coming through to the other side of his panic attack, he heard the front door opening and the sound of running footsteps through the foyer. Mikey appeared and hung up his phone, sliding it into his pocket and crouching down next to him, his eyes widening slightly when he saw the bottle on the floor and smelled the gin.

“Did you drink this, Gee?” he asked softly, looking down at him with not a hint of judgment in his eyes.

Gerard shook his head no and wiped the sleeve of his sweatshirt across his face, seeing Mikey close his eyes and let out a relieved sigh. “I was going to,” he mumbled, staring at the clear puddle in which Mikey was crouched, “I think I was going to. But you called me and I dropped it. Like you knew or something.”

“Maybe I did somehow. I just wanted to check on you,” Mikey shrugged, grabbing Gerard’s arm and pulling on it gently, “Come on, let’s get you into some clothes that aren’t soaked in liquor.”

—

Gerard was sitting at the island a half hour later in pajama pants, sipping gingerly on a tea that Mikey had made for him before cleaning up the gin puddle. He rested his head in his arms on the countertop and listened to the sound of his brother’s voice on the phone in the other room.

“Okay,” Mikey said, his voice coming from behind Gerard now, “Lynz is gonna grab Bandit from the bus stop and take her tonight. Told her not to worry.” 

Gerard nodded against his arms. He was sad that he couldn’t hang out with Bandit again tonight but he didn’t want her to see him like this, while he was this much of a mess.

Mikey sat down in the chair next to him and placed a hand on his back, the weight of it comforting to his nervous system. “Do you want to talk about it?” his brother asked.

“I don’t know, Mikes,” Gerard breathed, turning his head to the side in his arms to look at his brother, “I’m just fucking depressed and I don’t know what to do with myself.”

“You could have called, Gee,” Mikey appealed, squeezing his shoulder.

“It’s only been two days. I didn’t want to bother anyone.”

“I get that, Gerard, but I’m pretty sure that kind of excuse only applies when you’re not a recovering alcoholic sitting in a pool of gin. Especially when you know that I know how this feels.”

Gerard sighed and closed his eyes, his head pounding at the temples. “I feel so alone, Mikey,” he mumbled into the crook of his arm, “I can’t believe I let him do this to me again. I hate him so much for this but I miss him every fucking second of the day.”

Mikey leaned down and wrapped an arm around Gerard’s back, resting his head on the other’s shoulder. “I’m right here, Gee. Not going anywhere, okay?”

Gerard sniffled and nodded, leaning into Mikey. “I don’t want to fucking cry anymore for the rest of my life.”

“Then don’t,” Mikey pulled back and flashed him a sympathetic smile, “You wanna watch a movie or something? Get takeout?”

Gerard just nodded and let Mikey lead him to the couch, plopping down with a blanket and staying put for hours. Mikey chose horror movie after horror movie and Gerard stared at the tv but he wasn’t really paying attention, although it did make him smile whenever his brother laughed at the bad effects. When the pizza arrived, Mikey insisted that Gerard eat a slice and wouldn’t back down until he did, even though he really wasn’t hungry.

He must have passed out at some point in the evening because he awoke to Mikey standing over him and nudging him awake, telling him to go to his room. Gerard mumbled something about Mikey acting like their mother before grumpily wrapping the throw blanket around him like a cape and shuffling toward the stairs, picking up Bert’s t-shirt from the floor on the way.

Gerard fell asleep on top of his duvet, tangled in the throw blanket, with his nose pressed into Bert’s t-shirt.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright so this is the last chapter. Sorry it took me forever! Thanks again to throwupsparkles for helping me talk through the plot! Thanks to everyone whose been reading and I hope I’ve made you proud! Oh and I read back through from the beginning before I posted this and I fixed a really stupid and kind of major continuity error so if you noticed it before, no u didn’t xoxo

Gerard opened his eyes the next morning, squinting in anticipation of the sunlight through the windows, but he was relieved to find that his room was still dark. Although he didn’t really have anywhere to be and no alarm even set on his phone, the relief that came with waking up before morning light to the discovery that there’s more time to sleep did not escape him. He rolled over and closed his eyes to go back to sleep but he could hear the birds outside beginning to awaken, which reminded him of one of the hotel rooms he’d shared with Bert toward the end of tour where they’d gone to sleep around the same time. They’d talked all night about everything under the sun, Bert making him laugh so hard at some points that he thought he might throw up, and he’d fallen asleep with his face buried against the other’s neck, feeling Bert’s chest move with his breath and listening to the birds. 

He laid in bed for the better part of an hour trying to will himself back to sleep, but it was becoming clear that his brain was in full morning mode and he’d already started thinking about coffee and possibly a cigarette on the porch. Based on his habits of the last couple of days, he would most likely take an unplanned nap in the middle of the day so he figured it really didn’t matter anyway. He got out of bed and padded downstairs, flipping the light on in the kitchen and using the dimmer switch to bring it down to a respectable level. The clock on the microwave told him that it was 6:26 am and he could see the sky beginning to brighten outside through the window over the sink. He set the coffee maker and grabbed a mug from the cupboard, remembering that Mikey was asleep in the guest room and almost grabbing one for him, too, but he probably wouldn’t be awake for at least another three hours. 

Gerard definitely felt at least a little better knowing that his brother was there and was grateful that he’d stayed, although he did not appreciate Mikey practically force-feeding him pizza the night before. Gee opened the fridge to peruse its contents but didn’t find anything worthwhile, or at least that he felt like making, and anyway, Mikey wasn’t awake yet to tell him what to do, so coffee would do just fine for now. As he waited for the coffee maker, he wondered vaguely what he was even going to do today without either Bandit or the promise of a relapse. He figured he should probably start writing or at least do something creative, and he thought maybe he would call Frank later and toss some ideas around with him. Maybe he would be okay, he thought as he poured coffee into his mug, adding a little milk just to cool it down. 

Just then, the doorbell sounded from the front of the house and Gerard jumped at the sudden noise and furrowed his brows a bit. He figured it was probably Lynz needing something from the house before bringing Bandit to school— he wasn’t sure why she would ring the doorbell but he thought maybe she’d forgotten her keys or that she was trying to be respectful or something. He took a quick sip of his coffee before placing it back down on the counter and heading to the foyer, pulling the door open. It wasn’t Lynz.

It was Bert.

 _Was_ it Bert? He wondered maybe if he was still asleep and dreaming, which would make sense given the strange hour at which he’d woken up, and it would also make sense of Bert standing there on his front porch with a suitcase beside him. Although, he’d never been able to perfect lucid dreaming no matter how hard he tried, so he also wondered which was more probable, Bert actually standing on his porch in front of him or having finally gotten the hang of lucid dreaming. He was in the middle of solidifying his bets on lucid dreaming, trying to think about what he’d done differently before he’d gone to bed so that he could remember for next time, when Bert spoke.

“God, I’m so glad you’re home. I was worried I’d have to sit on your steps for hours waiting for you like a simp. Not that I don’t deserve that because I do, and I _am_ a simp, but...fuck, I mean, of course you’re home, it’s six in the morning. Did I wake you up? Fuck, I did, didn’t I?” Gerard just raised his eyebrows and leaned against the door frame. “I’m sorry, I didn’t really think about that, I just kind of got on the next plane and I just...well, so here’s the thing, Gee, the second I got home, I realized I was being so fucking stupid and if I had the chance to be with you again, why would I ruin it _again_? And I spent literally one night at home and it was fucking excruciating, and I didn’t even sleep. It was awful. I literally booked a flight on my phone at three am and left my house an hour later because I needed to see you, and I’m so sorry I did that to you but I’m here now and I—“ He stopped and let out an exasperated sigh. “Are you okay?”

Gerard stared at Bert in a daze and bit gently at the inside of his lip, his brain slowly arriving at acceptance that Bert was actually here and that this was reality. He rubbed the sleep out of his eyes and stood up from the door frame, folding his arms across his chest and studying Bert again, since he was now pretty sure that the other man was, in fact, real. 

Bert was wearing what he was always wearing, shorts and a t-shirt, a t-shirt that probably smelled like the one Gerard had upstairs in his bed, probably even more so since he’d spent days crying into the other one. Besides that, Bert sort of looked like shit, if Gerard was being honest; the shorter man had dark circles under his eyes and his hair was all over the place, his facial hair starting to get scruffy, and the combination of the three resulted in a mugshot-esque appearance. In spite of this, he wanted so badly to grab Bert and kiss him, to feel his skin again, to be as close to him as possible, but the other part of him wanted to deck the other man in the jaw. He refrained from doing either and simply brought his eyes back up to Bert’s baby blues.

“I’m really fucking mad at you,” Gerard stated matter-of-factly. Bert’s face fell and he averted his eyes to the porch, nodding slightly. 

Gerard had, during the past few days, gone through several dramatic, movie-worthy speeches in his head that he would deliver if given this exact opportunity, but for some reason he couldn’t remember any of them now. He wanted to scream at Bert, wanted to assault him with a barrage of hard-hitting metaphors that detailed his emotions, to throw it in his face that he’d almost broken his sobriety just to make Bert feel bad— even though he knew that one wasn’t anyone’s fault but his own. Although any of these options would have sounded appealing yesterday, Gerard couldn’t make any of them make sense in his head now, couldn’t form any of them into coherent strings of sentences. His thoughts on those things were garbled and the only certainty he currently knew was the anger, fear, and doubt that every neuron in his brain was screaming at him. And despite the naivety that he knew followed it, he also felt relieved that Bert was here, that Gerard had another chance even though he wasn’t sure if he should give Bert one. 

They stood there in the silence until Bert cleared his throat and closed his eyes. “Do you want me to leave?”

Gerard’s eyes fell to the handle of Bert’s suitcase where the other man’s grip had visibly tightened, his knuckles white around the plastic. Gee sighed and dropped his arms from his chest, internally weighing his anger and hurt against his relief, sliding his gaze back up to the dark circles under Bert’s eyes. “Have you eaten?” 

“What?” Bert opened his eyes and looked back up at him quizzically.

“You’ve been flying. I can make something. For breakfast.” Gerard realized as he said it that he actually felt hungry for the first time in days. 

Bert’s lips were slow to form a smile and Gerard could see his whole body relax a little as he stepped aside and gestured into the foyer.

“I’d like that, Gee.”

—

Gerard moved around his kitchen gathering dishware for breakfast, glancing over at Bert every few seconds like he would disappear. He was still in a bit of a shock-state that the other man was here, sitting in his kitchen, something he’d merely imagined several times over the past fifteen years, let alone the past couple of days, and yet there Bert was, sitting at Gee’s island and drinking coffee from one of his mugs.

Gerard supervised the eggs cooking away on the stove and fought himself to keep his eyes trained firmly on the sizzling oil in the pan. “So you took a fifteen hour flight back home and then stayed for less than a day before taking another fifteen hour flight.” Gerard began wearily, poking an egg unnecessarily with the spatula in his hand to keep himself busy.

Bert took a sip of coffee and cleared his throat, wrapping his fingers protectively around the mug as if he didn’t know what else to do with them. “Uhm. Yeah, I guess so,” Bert replied, his voice softening a little, “I missed you. A lot.”

Gerard could feel his heart beating in his throat and he just sighed and swallowed hard to make it go away as he settled slices of cheese on top of the cooking eggs and plucked his bagels out of the toaster oven. “And what about your family? You just left them just like that after everything you said to me?” Gerard kept the volume of his voice level but couldn’t keep the bitterness from leaking into his tone. 

“I didn’t just leave. We had a fight, Alison and I. When I got back. A big one. I told her everything and she just...didn’t understand,” Gerard turned the burner off and assembled the breakfast sandwiches, turning around to slide a plate to Bert and leaning against the counter, the other man’s eyes finding his own quickly. “She didn’t understand how I could be gone for two months and suddenly be in love with someone else. She didn’t even put much stock into the fact that I chose her, that I came back. She said it didn’t matter because she’d already lost me, that she could see it when I looked at her.”

Gerard rolled his eyes and took an angry bite of his bagel sandwich before dropping it back onto his plate. “So what, you just came all the way here because you got rejected by your number one so hey, why not try number two again?” He fumed through his mouthful of bagel.

“No, Gerard,” Bert sat back in his chair, crumpling his hands in his lap, “I came here because I spent twelve hours with my family thinking that’s what was going to make me happy and I was so miserable that I couldn’t even fake it in front of my wife. Not even seeing my daughters made me feel much better. I thought of nothing but you every second of the day, and my fucking chest hurt so bad that there was a point where I thought for sure I was having a heart attack. I haven’t slept since the night before our last show because I can’t sleep on planes and it turns out I can’t fucking sleep without you by my side either and I feel like I’m going insane. I came here because I realized I was making an awful mistake and I couldn’t blame it on drugs this time and I knew that I had to fix it before it was too late like last time.”

Gerard was silent, staring at the floor tiles as his fingers worried absentmindedly at the string of his pajama pants.

Bert sighed and pushed his chair back, walking around the island and leaning against the counter across from Gerard. “Tell me how you’re feeling, Gee. Whatever it is, I’ll take it. Yell if you have to. I know I deserve it.” 

Gerard let out a dry laugh and folded his arms across his chest, tipping his head to the side a bit and looking at Bert incredulously. “Where do I even start? Am I supposed to just let go of the fact that you put me through all that in the first place only to change your mind? Am I supposed to just hand you a second chance just because you’re tired and...fucking...cute? And what about your kids? You can’t share custody from two different continents.” He sighed and looked back down to the floor tiles, continuing softly, “And I’m worried this is too good to be true, if I’m being completely fucking honest. I _want_ to forgive you because I want this, but I can’t handle losing you again because I’ve already done it twice and it fucking sucks.”

“I’m not asking for forgiveness. I know it’s not that easy. I know I can’t just move in and buy us a white picket fence and expect everything to be fine with us. I’m asking for a chance to prove to you that you can trust me,” Bert replied resolutely, “It’ll take work and I know that, and I know we have a lot to work out but I _want_ to work it out. I want to do the work, and I won’t run away, I won’t change my mind, and you won’t lose me again because I’m all-in. Alison and I will figure out custody, I’ll take as many fifteen hour flights back and forth as it takes, but I want _you_ and no one and nothing else.” 

Gerard softened his stance and dropped his shoulders a little as he listened. 

“You’re in my blood, Gee. Given the past few days, my body even knows that you’re it for me, it’s like you’re part of my muscle memory and it all came flooding back the first time you kissed me again on that fucking grass, and when you’re not there anymore, my body refuses to function, refuses to let me sleep or eat. I love you and I’ll _always_ love you, and I would very much like to prove that to you. You’re-“

Gerard cut Bert off by taking a step forward and kissing him with all of the energy he’d spent missing him and hating him over the last few days, his heart fluttering at the familiar smell of the other’s skin. Gerard felt Bert’s gentle fingers in the hair at the back of his neck and he melted into the other man, savoring the feeling in the case that this really was a dream and that Bert could just disappear at any moment.

“I love you,” Gerard rasped against Bert’s lips, “I’m so fucking glad you came here.” He wrapped his arms around Bert’s waist and pressed himself tightly to the other in order to get as close as possible.

“I love you, too. I’m never gonna fucking hurt you again, Gee, I promise you,” Bert whispered against the skin beside his ear, pressing a soft kiss there.

Gerard buried his face into the crook of Bert’s neck and relaxed into the other’s arms as Bert’s fingers snuck under his t-shirt and rubbed circles against the skin of his lower back. “I’m sorry I left you first. I should have stayed,” he mumbled before suddenly pulling away to find Bert’s eyes, “You are good enough. Do you know that? For me and for yourself.”

Bert hesitated until Gerard cupped the sides of the other’s face in his hands, then he finally nodded.

“Eat your food,” Gerard ordered, pressing another kiss to Bert’s lips because he couldn’t help himself before shooing him back to the island, “We’ve gotta get you to sleep because you look like absolute shit.”

“Don’t be rude, I don’t look that bad,” Bert sulked on his way back to where his plate was sitting on the counter and took a bite of his sandwich, looking thoughtful as he chewed. “I want to fuck, though.”

“Are you kidding? You don’t even look like you’d stay awake long enough for me to get your pants off.”

Bert simply rolled his eyes, but Gerard was right because once they’d finished eating and he’d gotten the other man upstairs, Bert passed out almost the second he hit the mattress. Gee nestled his arm under Bert’s head and watched him sleep for awhile, eventually closing his eyes and falling asleep himself to the sound of Bert’s steady breath against his neck.

—

When Gerard woke up again, he waited a few moments to open his eyes, just in case the morning really had been a dream, but when he finally opened them, he turned his head to an awake Bert, who was still nuzzled into his shoulder. He pressed a kiss into Bert’s hair and inhaled the scent of the other’s shampoo. “Why didn’t you wake me, hm?” Gerard mumbled.

“Wanted to, but you looked too peaceful, I couldn’t.”

“What time is it, anyway? We didn’t sleep all day, did we?” Gee started to turn to grab his phone but realized he must have left it downstairs. 

In any case, Bert had latched onto his shoulder as soon as he’d tried to sit up and had begun pulling him back down to the mattress, propping himself up on an elbow and pressing kisses to Gerard’s collarbone. “Does it matter? You’re a rockstar, you don’t have anywhere to be,” Bert muttered, sliding downward and lifting the hem of Gerard’s t-shirt, kissing a line up his stomach as he revealed more skin, “Plus, I’m rested.”

“Oh, are you?” Gerard responded with a laugh, pulling his shirt over his head to help Bert out.

“Mhm,” Bert hummed as he ghosted his fingertips over one of Gerard’s nipples and across his throat, looking up at Gee through his eyelashes, “I’m so rested that you might even be able to get my pants off.”

“They’re already off,” Gerard quipped, noting the growing pressure against the side of his thigh from inside Bert’s boxers.

“Good, more time for everything else,” Bert breathed as he slid Gerard’s pajama pants down and tossed them onto the floor. His mouth found a spot on Gerard’s hip just above the waistband of his boxers and he kissed at it gently, running his tongue over the skin before delivering a playful bite. Bert looked up at him again as he increased the pressure of his teeth on his skin and Gerard gasped and bucked his hips.

“F-fuck, com’ere,” Gerard stuttered as he yanked Bert up and wrapped his arms around the other’s neck, ravaging his lips with his own like it was the first time. Bert straddled him and Gerard hummed into his mouth as he felt the other’s hips grinding into his own. Bert placed his hands lovingly on either side of Gerard’s face and kissed down his jawline, a loud groan falling from Bert’s lips as Gerard moved against him just right.

Gee slapped a hand over Bert’s mouth and shushed him, glancing at the door as if Mikey would simply burst right in. “You have to be quiet, my brother’s here,” Gerard whispered.

Bert swatted Gee’s hand from his face. “So? What’s he gonna do, yell at you for having a boy over? This is your house, for christsakes,” he snickered, grinding hard into Gerard’s hips before sitting up, pulling his shirt over his head, and leaning back down to pull at Gerard’s boxers all in one swift motion.

Gerard scoffed and tried to be annoyed but his hard-on was distracting him and he closed his eyes as his boxers were pulled down over his hips. “Just...keep it down because— _fuck, Bert_ ,” he gasped as he felt fingers pushing inside of him and, simultaneously, Bert’s tongue gliding over the head of his cock. Gerard arched his back trying to force Bert’s fingers against his prostate and succeeding, letting out a low moan. 

When he opened his eyes again, he suddenly remembered that he actually had lube here, which felt weird to think about since they’d gone so long without it on tour, but they’d both always liked it a little rough, anyway. Nevertheless, he twisted his upper body and rummaged through the nightstand, tossing the bottle down to Bert. He whimpered involuntarily when Bert’s fingers left him but didn’t have to wait long before they were back, slick with lube and sliding into him quickly.

Gerard gasped and arched his hips, Bert tonguing ever so lightly at the head of his cock. “God, Bert, p-please,” he spluttered, moaning desperately as the other man pulled his tongue away completely.

Bert smirked up at him for what felt to Gerard like forever, feeling the other’s fingers pressing against his prostate over and over again as he did so. Gerard was starting to feel frantic, like if Bert didn’t touch him soon he was going to pass out or die. He reached his own hand down to wrap around his cock and Bert smacked it away, grinning mischievously.

“Hands behind your head,” Bert demanded, and Gerard did as he was told, folding his arms behind his head and sighing impatiently.

“I fucking love teasing you,” Bert continued, his tone lowered to a frequency that drove Gee crazy, blowing a breath out over the head of Gerard’s cock and watching him shudder, “Gets me so fucking hot to watch you squirm.” He pulled his fingers out and pushed back in hard with a third, producing a cry from Gerard whose hips were thrusting uncontrollably against Bert’s hand and into the air. Bert used his free hand to push down his own boxers and shimmied out of them, Gerard’s lips parting in disbelief as he watched the other man stroke his own cock.

“Not fair,” he whined, lifting his hips again.

“Oh?” Bert replied with raised eyebrows, “I can do this all day, Gee.” He sat back on his heels and tipped his head back as he stroked himself, releasing a performative moan and pressing hard at Gerard’s prostate. Gerard whined loudly and Bert let out a low laugh, “I can’t believe I even thought for one second about giving this up.”

Gerard groaned as Bert pulled his fingers out and dumped more lube into his hand, slicking it over his own cock with his bottom lip between his teeth and watching Gerard’s hips move. Gerard felt like he was high, training his eyes on Bert’s moving hand and trying to control his breathing as his cock throbbed.

After what felt like years, Bert settled on his knees between Gerard’s legs and lined himself up with his entrance, pressing against him lightly for a few moments and enjoying the other’s frustrated moans and whimpers before finally thrusting his hips roughly into him. Gerard cried out Bert’s name and arched his back, pulling his knees up for a better angle.

“Jesus...fuck, Gerard,” Bert groaned, tipping his head back as he quickened his pace.

Gerard met Bert’s thrusts with his hips and silently thanked whoever was listening that Bert was so fucking good at this because he’d found his prostate within a few seconds and hit it each time after. Gerard could already see the pre-come leaking from his cock. His body felt like it was on fire and he went as long as he could without begging for Bert to touch him, an endless stream of incoherent words and phrases punctuated by terribly desperate moans tumbling from his lips.

“Bert, please,” Gerard whimpered, his voice sounding small in his ears.

Bert leaned down and nibbled once at Gerard’s earlobe, the head of his cock against Bert’s stomach making his legs twitch. “Do you wanna come, baby?” Bert drawled into Gerard’s ear as he continued to slam into his prostate, which induced a string of loud moans and pleas from the man underneath him. Bert pulled back a little to look at the other man and ran his thumb over Gerard’s bottom lip before pressing his lips chastely to Gee’s and leaning back down again to nip at his earlobe. 

Gerard heard Bert’s quiet laugh in his ear and, seconds later, felt Bert’s fingers wrap around his cock. “Come for me, Gee,” Bert whispered, his own breath ragged now. 

He inhaled sharply and fucked into Bert’s hand, his breath coming back out in a broken moan. Mere seconds after Bert had touched his cock, Gerard felt the heat at the bottom of his stomach spreading quickly through his body and out into his fingertips and toes, and he pulled his arms out from under his head and tangled his fingers in Bert’s hair, screaming Bert’s name as he came onto their stomachs. Bert came seconds later, moaning wildly into the crook of Gerard’s neck. Bert moved his hips against the other’s until they’d both come down from their highs and then collapsed beside Gerard on the mattress.

“So that’s how I get you to be loud, huh?” Bert muttered, trying to catch his breath, “I even kept it down just for you, but I’m pretty sure you blew our cover, if there ever was one.”

Gerard waved his hand lazily in the general direction of Bert’s shoulder in an attempt to hit him but missed and gave up, flopping his arm back down on the mattress. “You’re a fucking asshole,” he mumbled and closed his eyes, “A fucking hot...fucking asshole. Who I love.”

“Mhm,” Bert hummed, and a minute later, Gerard felt him shifting on the mattress. “Hey, I was looking for this.”

Gerard furrowed his brows and opened his eyes, squinting against the light of the room. Bert was holding up the wrinkled white t-shirt. “Why you tryna steal my shit? You don’t even like Corpus,” Bert laughed, tossing it onto the floor with his other discarded clothes.

Gerard rolled onto his side and frowned, nuzzling his face against Bert’s shoulder. “It ended up in my suitcase somehow. It smelled like you, so I slept with it. I missed you.”

A warm smile spread across Bert’s face and he wrapped an arm around Gerard’s waist and rested his hand on the small of the other’s back, pressing a soft kiss to the man’s temple.

“I’m here, Gee. And I’m not going anywhere.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh and also I know Bert would never even have heard the word “simp” but I thought it was funny so I kept it in, alright? sue me


End file.
